Delivered by an Omnissa Certified Instructor, the Horizon 8: Install, Configure, and Manage course teaches IT professionals to effectively install and configure the components of Horizon 8. Learners will also gain practical skills to solve a broad range of business challenges through a combination of hands-on labs, simulations, and interactive lectures.

Target Audience

Intermediate to advanced practitioners that design, install, manage, optimize, and troubleshoot enterprise desktops and applications in their environment.

Prerequisites

Recommended:

• Understand fundamental Networking / Storage and Infrastructure concepts
• A working knowledge of Horizon 8
• A background in End-User Computing

Course Objectives

By the end of this session, attendees should be able to:

• Understand the course scope, structure, and role-based outcomes for Horizon 8 installation, configuration, and management.
• Explain Horizon 8 architecture, components, and connection workflows used to deliver virtual desktops and applications.
• Install and configure Horizon Connection Servers to authenticate users and broker desktops and applications.
• Create and manage Horizon desktop pools to deliver consistent and scalable virtual desktops.
• Install and configure Horizon Client to provide secure end-user access to desktops and applications.
• Install and configure the Horizon Agent on Windows systems to enable desktop and application delivery features.
• Build and optimize Windows gold images for standardized Horizon desktop deployment.
• Configure RDS server farms and published applications to deliver shared desktops and apps.
• Prepare and deploy Linux virtual desktops using Horizon 8.
• Deploy and configure Unified Access Gateway to enable secure external access to Horizon resources.
• Monitor Horizon environments and support users using built-in helpdesk and troubleshooting tools.
• Configure content and device redirection to balance security and user experience.
• Design and scale Horizon pods to support growth and performance requirements.
• Implement multi-pod and multi-site Horizon architectures for global availability and resiliency.
• Plan and perform Horizon backups, recovery, and upgrades to maintain operational stability.
• Integrate additional Horizon authentication options to strengthen access security.

Course Modules

1 Course introduction

• Introductions and course logistics
• Course objectives

2 Horizon 8 overview and architecture

• Introduction to Horizon 8
• Horizon 8 components and architecture
• How an internal connection works
• How an external connection works

3 Horizon Connection Server

• Planning and prerequisites
• Connection Server overview and installation
• Initial configuration of the Connection Server
• Register resource capacity
• Additional recommended configuration

4 Horizon desktop pools

• About desktop pools
• Provisioning desktop pools
• Customizing clones
• Creating desktop pools
• User entitlements
• Updating desktop pools

5 Horizon Client

• Horizon clients and their features
• Installing the Horizon Client
• Configuring the Horizon Client
• Upgrading the Horizon Client

6 Horizon Agent for Windows

• Features of the Horizon Agent for Windows
• Installing and Configuring the Horizon Agent for Windows
• Applying policies to the Horizon Agent
• Horizon Integrated Printing
• Upgrading the Horizon Agent

7 Building a golden image for Horizon

• Outlining the role of a golden image in VDI
• Implementing optimizations in a Windows image
• Building a Windows golden image

8 Horizon 8 server farms and published apps

• Explain Horizon 8 farms
• Provision server farms
• Walkthrough of farm wizard
• Deploy and configure Horizon published applications
• Deploy and configure published apps on demand

9 Linux on Horizon 8

• Explain and summarize the features of the Horizon Agent for Linux
• Install and configure the Horizon Agent for Linux
• Apply policies to the Horizon Agent for Linux
• Configure printing for Linux
• Perform upgrades of Horizon Agent for Linux
• Build a Linux golden image

10 Unified Access Gateway for Horizon deployments

• What is Unified Access Gateway?
• Deploying Unified Access Gateway
• Configure two-factor authentication

11 Monitor Horizon 8 and use the Helpdesk

• Monitor the infrastructure with the Horizon 8 console
• Manage and troubleshoot user sessions
• Collect Horizon log files

12 Content and device redirection with Horizon 8

• Redirection functions and benefits
• Device redirection
• Client drive redirection
• Web content redirection

13 Horizon 8 pod scaling, redundancy, and load balancing

• Recognize the design principles and best practices for scaling a Horizon 8 pod
• Implement multiple Connection Servers for scale and resilience
• Implement multiple Unified Access Gateways for scale and resilience

14 Multiple Horizon 8 pods and multiple sites

• Configure Cloud Pod Architecture

15 Backup, recovery, and upgrading Horizon 8

• Implement backup and recovery for Connection Servers
• Perform an upgrade of a Horizon 8 pod
• Perform an upgrade of Unified Access Gateways

16 Additional authentication options with Horizon 8

• User authentication options on Connection Servers
• Configuring integration with Omnissa Access
• True SSO