Advanced NetscalerCustomizations

Delivered at BriForum 2011 by Sam Jacobs

Director of Technology Development at IPM

Session Topics

•Netscaler Themes

•Customization Tools

•Login page customizations

•NavUI customizations

•OS/Browser detection

•Creation of custom pages / vServer

•Customized Netscaler logging

Netscaler Themes

•Carbon Fiber (Caxton) – built-in •White Pearl – downloadable skin

http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX123607

Carbon Fiber White Pearl

Advanced Netscaler Customizations

.CSS files are responsible for:page/font colors, font size, margins, backgrounds, borders, alignment

Theme Comparison

White PearlCarbon Fiber

Can you create other themes …?

Customization Tools

•Secure FTP (SFTP) client (e.g. WinSCP)

•Transfer files to/from Netscaler

•Developer Tools (IE / Chrome)

•Firebug (FireFox)

•Inspect code/image source, styles, etc.

•Editor (VS, Notepad++, etc.)

•Keyword color-coding, auto-complete

•Use a wildcard SSL certificate !

Logon Page Customizations

/netscaler/ns_gui/vpn

index.html – main HTML content

nsshare.js – Javascript routines to display banners, headers

and footers

login.js – Javascript validation routines (also contains

routines to display AD and RSA password fields)

/netscaler/ns_gui/vpn/images – contains images and .css

/netscaler/ns_gui/vpn/resources – for versions 9.2+ text localization files (e.g. en.xml)

NavUI Customizations

/netscaler/portal/templates/homepage.html – for NavUI

or Web Interface site if using ICA proxy.

Persisting Customizations

Unless you are careful, your customizations will be

lost when the Netscaler is rebooted!

Create a directory for your customizations, e.g.

/var/custom_files/

Edit the file rc.netscaler (in /nsconfig), and add:

cp -r /var/custom_files/ns_gui/* /netscaler/ns_gui

OS/Browser Detection

•Detection via device User-Agent header

•iPad / iPhone / Blackberry / Android detection

•Deliver customized pages for each device

•Citrix Receiver auto-configuration

•Information for Help Desk

User-Agent headers

IE 8 (Windows 7)Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/4.0; SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; InfoPath.2; .NET4.0C; .NET4.0E; FDM; MS-RTC LM 8)

IE 7 CompatibilityMozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/4.0; SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; InfoPath.2; .NET4.0C; .NET4.0E; FDM; MS-RTC LM 8)

Google ChromeMozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/12.0.742.100 Safari/534.30

iPadMozilla/5.0 (iPad; U; CPU OS 4_3_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8J3 Safari/6533.18.5

iPhoneMozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A543a Safari/419.3

BlackberryMozilla/5.0 (BlackBerry; U; BlackBerry 9800; en-US) AppleWebKit/534.8+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/6.0.0.448 Mobile Safari/534.8+http://whatsmyuseragent.com/

Spoofing the User-Agent - Firefox

about:config

Filter on: useragent

Spoofing the User-Agent - Safari

Preferences | Advanced

Develop | User Agent

Check:Show Develop menu in menu bar

Spoofing the User-Agent - Chrome

Start Chrome with desired User-Agent: (shown here starting as IE8)

C:\Users\XXXX\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe --user-agent="Mozilla/4.0 (compatible;

MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.0; Trident/4.0; Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1) ; .NET CLR

3.5.30729)“

OR

Edit chrome.dll with a hex editor (e.g. Xvi32) … see:

How to Change User Agent String in Google Chrome Browser

http://www.labnol.org/software/change-google-chrome-user-agent-string/4566/

Spoofing the User-Agent – IE8

Run GPEDIT.MSC:

Expand:User Configuration Windows Settings IE Maintenance Connection

Double-click on User Agent String

Or download:UA Pick User Agent Switcher:http://ieaddons.com/en/addons/detail.aspx?id=2040

Demo

Mobile device detection(User-Agent)

Custom Pages for Each vServer

location.host – URL entered by the user

location.host.toLowerCase() – for a case-insensitive comparison

if (location.host.toLowerCase()=="symphony.ipm.com") {

location.href="symphony.html";

}

Make sure you use a wildcard SSL certificate!

Windows 7

iPad

<a href=“http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/citrix-receiver-for-ipad/id363501921 ">Click here</a> to download the Citrix Receiver for iPad.

citrixreceiver://createprofile/?s=https%3A%2F%2Fsymphony.ipm.com&pname=IPM%20Application%20Portal&d=IPM&gw=1&gwt=2&gwa=3

iPhone

Android

Blackberry

Citrix Receiver Auto-Configuration

Mobile Device URL Generator http://community.citrix.com/MobileReceiverSetupUrlGenerator/

Citrix Receiver Auto-Configuration

Customized Netscaler Logging

Customized Netscaler Logging

• Purchase a retail copy of SolarWinds Kiwi Syslog Server (the free version does not include ODBC logging to SQL): http://www.kiwisyslog.com/kiwi-syslog-server-overview/

• Sample scripts may be found here: (John Smithttp://xen-trifuge.com/2010/06/16/project-poindexter-2/

• Configure the Netscaler to send syslog output to Kiwi:

Resources

IPM TechDev Corner:http://www.ipm.com/category/technical-insight/techdev-corner/

VMwareInfo.com:

http://VMwareInfo.com

Citrix AGEE Forum:http://forums.citrix.com/forum.jspa?forumID=159

Closing

Thank you.