In this blog, we are going to see how can we use Nexthink to monitor W365 Cloud PC and provides the user experience details of using the Cloud PC.
What is NexThink?.
NexThink is an end user experience monitoring software with analytics and automation capabilities. Many organizations are using NexThink as their preferred end user monitoring software. NexThink works in a Client-Server architecture where the data from NexThink agent(termed as NexThink collector) is lively gathered by the NexThink Portal and Engine situation in either NexThink SaaS cloud or in customer’s datacenter.
What all information NexThink captures?.
1.Cloud PC’s hardware information(CPU,RAM,GPU), system drives, free space, logged in user etc.
2.W365 Performance including user interactions, CPU, and I/O throughput, software installs, user level execution, system warnings etc.
3.Intelligent auto heal/self-heal capability
4.Gather end user sentiments via targeted campaigns.
License Requirements
NexThink comes with two different licenses for end point devices which covers Mac, workstations and VDIs and server licenses. As Windows 365 is a single user VDI/Cloud PC desktop, Nexthink require Nexthink Endpoint device license.
NexThink Agent requirement
Standard Windows collector package can be deployed on Cloud PCs.
Cloud PC device Properties
NexThink console will display the properties of the Cloud PC including the hardware details, domain details, startup details, local drives status and security overview. The below diagram shows the granular level of information about a Cloud PC.
Timeline view in NexThink
Timeline view is an excellent option in NexThink to determine the activities happened during a particular time period.
For example, users in a session host complains extreme slowness at 10:14 AM local time and the admin can easily find out the activities happened during that time slot using NexThink timeline view. It provides information about any software crashes, top CPU and Memory consumed processes, active user interactions etc. The below diagram shows the outlook traffic activity happened during a user session.
One Click Investigations
The other cool feature of NexThink is the one click investigations. You will be able to get the device errors, warnings generated in a session host using the one click investigation. Using the deep dive console you can go to granular level of logging. The below diagram shows an example of one click investigation to find the device warnings.
REMOTE ACTIONS (SELF HEAL AUTOMATION)
Nexthink can execute remote actions which can do self healing and guided healing. You can use a variety of out of the box remote actions and also can create your own powershell script and deploy it as a remote action on Windows 365 devices. The below screenshot shows a sample out of the box remote action which is querying the Outlook Storage Information.
NEXTHINK CAMPAIGNS(USER SURVEYS & GUIDED RESOLUTION)
NexThink can be used to do targeted end user campaigns. The Admin can send campaigns to gain the user sentiments provide a guided resolution for an issue or request and can be used against in measuring the success of W365 deployments. The below diagram shows an example of end user campaign sent to an W365 user.
You can create custom dashboards to get insights about the W365 deployment and device performance.
Please do let me know if you have any queries or comments.
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