ExtraHop Networks, the leading provider of network-based application performance management (APM) solutions, today announced the launch of the first-ever agentless APM solution that is verified Citrix Ready to be compatible for Citrix XenDesktop, Citrix XenApp, and Citrix NetScaler.

With real-time analysis of virtual desktop wire protocols, the ExtraHop Citrix Module for XenDesktop and XenApp enables IT teams to identify and resolve small issues before they become major problems, quickly determine which part of the infrastructure is responsible for degradation in performance, and gain other valuable insights to help manage their desktop virtualization deployments.

This latest innovation from ExtraHop will prove immensely valuable for the 260,000 organizations worldwide that use Citrix desktop virtualization solutions to support large numbers of distributed users. While other APM products claim to adequately monitor performance for Citrix solutions, ExtraHop’s Citrix Ready partnership enables the company to achieve deeper application performance visibility with more-thorough and more-accurate analysis than any non-real-time analysis solution on the market today.

The new ExtraHop module has already received an eager response from companies in various industries, including healthcare. “Delivering a high-quality and consistent user experience is our top priority as it ensures that the members we serve receive timely and quality care,” explains Joseph Steele, Vice President of IT at MedSolutions, an ExtraHop customer. “To achieve consistent system performance 24×7, we use several monitoring tools. ExtraHop is the only solution that enables us to view detailed, real-time Citrix performance by user, session, and client type. With ExtraHop, we can eliminate potential trouble spots before they affect the end users of our call-center applications and online portal.”

“With more and more enterprises delivering virtual desktops to enable mobile workstyles, we are working with our Citrix Ready partners like ExtraHop to help ensure customers have the best and most consistent experience with their virtual desktops. ExtraHop has built an elegant, agentless solution for monitoring the performance of our desktop virtualization solutions to track end-user performance and tie that activity back to the underlying infrastructure,” says Aimee Catalano, vice president of Alliance Marketing at Citrix. “This solution has the potential to address a real pain point for large desktop virtualization deployments.”

“Citrix transforms applications into a bitstream of pixels and clicks, creating an opaque black box,” says Jesse Rothstein, ExtraHop CEO and co-founder. “Without the key to that box, you simply can’t know what’s going on inside. Real-time analysis of the VDI protocols is that key, and ExtraHop is the only solution on the market that provides it. Furthermore, we deliver this unprecedented level of visibility without requiring any agents on desktops or servers.”

In addition to troubleshooting end-user experience and pinpointing general slowdowns, the ExtraHop Citrix Module monitors how much bandwidth each application consumes, Citrix license usage, and the types of client devices used, including tablets and smartphones. The comprehensive analysis also includes the ability to monitor virtual channels, enabling IT teams to see if users are running bandwidth-intensive multimedia, such as YouTube. For security and privacy purposes, the ExtraHop Citrix Module tracks clipboard and printer activity so that IT organizations can ensure that copy-and-paste and print operations are configured according to data-leakage prevention policies.

Unlike other monitoring solutions for Citrix that require agents, the ExtraHop system is a passive network appliance that does not require anything to be installed on servers or desktops. Deployment takes less than 15 minutes, using only a port mirror or network tap, and IT teams can start gathering application health and performance metrics immediately without configuration. In addition, because there are no agents to install, ExtraHop’s network-based approach works seamlessly with the increasing variety of end-user device types that IT organizations need to accommodate in their desktop virtualization deployments.