Administration

Table Of Contents
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A refresh preserves the unique computer information set up by QuickPrep or Sysprep. You do not need
to rerun Sysprep after a refresh to restore the SID or the GUIDs of third-party software installed in the
system drive.
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After you recompose a linked clone, View takes a new snapshot of the linked clone's OS disk. Future
refresh operations restore the OS data to that snapshot, not the one originally taken when the linked
clone was first created.
If you use native NFS snapshot (VAAI) technology to generate linked clones, certain vendors' NAS
devices take snapshots of the replica disk when they refresh the linked clones' OS disks. These NAS
devices do not support taking direct snapshots of each clone's OS disk.
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You can set a minimum number of ready, provisioned desktops that remain available for users to
connect to during the refresh operation. See "Keeping Linked-Clone Desktops Provisioned and Ready
During View Composer Operations" in the Setting Up Desktop and Application Pools in View document.
NOTE You can slow the growth of linked clones by redirecting their paging files and system temp files to a
temporary disk. When a linked clone is powered off, View replaces the temporary disk with a copy of the
original temporary disk that View Composer created with the linked-clone pool. This operation shrinks the
temporary disk to its original size.
You can configure this option when you create a linked-clone desktop pool.
Update Linked-Clone Desktops
You can update linked-clone virtual machines by creating a new base image on the parent virtual machine
and using the recompose feature to distribute the updated image to the linked clones.
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Prepare a Parent Virtual Machine to Recompose Linked Clones on page 127
Before you recompose a linked-clone desktop pool, you must update the parent virtual machine that
you used as a base image for the linked clones.
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Recompose Linked-Clone Virtual Machines on page 128
Machine recomposition simultaneously updates all the linked-clone virtual machines anchored to a
parent virtual machine.
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Updating Linked Clones with Recomposition on page 129
In a recomposition, you can provide operating system patches, install or update applications, or
modify the virtual machine hardware settings in all the linked clones in a desktop pool.
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Correcting an Unsuccessful Recomposition on page 130
You can correct a recomposition that failed. You can also take action if you accidentally recompose
linked clones using a different base image than the one you intended to use.
Prepare a Parent Virtual Machine to Recompose Linked Clones
Before you recompose a linked-clone desktop pool, you must update the parent virtual machine that you
used as a base image for the linked clones.
View Composer does not support recomposing linked clones that use one operating system to a parent
virtual machine that uses a different operating system. For example, you cannot use a snapshot of a
Windows 8 parent virtual machine to recompose a Windows 7 linked clone.
Chapter 7 Managing Linked-Clone Desktop Virtual Machines
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