Introduction

Managing a server farm requires some method of pulling all the server data together. The data must be stored, and, as changes are made to each server, the data must be updated. Simply gathering, storing, and updating data about the servers is not enough. You must have a way to access the data and make changes to it so that you can manage the members of your server farm. All these needs are provided by the Citrix Management Console (CMC).

Administrators have other needs in managing server farms. They must manage how applications are deployed to each server. They need to configure printer drivers. Finally, they need to have a central view into the connections that are running in the farm.

Citrix MetaFrame XP comes in three versions. The versions do not all have the same utilities. This chapter reviews the server farm management utilities and with which version of Citrix MetaFrame XP each can be used.

Using the Citrix Management Console

The CMC is a helpful new tool introduced with MetaFrame XP. It centralizes the management and administration process of the entire MetaFrame farm. The CMC is divided into two main panes: the left pane and the right pane. The left pane is organized in a tree-like view starting with the farm name, followed by all the various tools that manage attributes of the farm. The right pane displays information about the current selection in the left pane. Sometimes tabs are displayed in the right pane, allowing you...