UPM Archive – Deyda Consulting Blog

Finding in the Wild | Only the First User After a VDA Reboot Has a Problem

Interesting behavior with Windows Server 2025 + Citrix VDA + Citrix Profile Management (CPM): After a VDA restart, the first user logs on, and applications that should launch automatically suddenly do not start. Various startup mechanisms may be

Interesting behavior with Windows Server 2025 + Citrix VDA + Citrix Profile Management (CPM):

After a VDA restart, the first user logs on, and applications that should launch automatically suddenly do not start.

Various startup mechanisms may be affected:

HKLM\…\Run ❌
HKCU\…\Run ❌
Startup folder ❌

The curious part:

Once one user has logged on, startup applications work normally again for all subsequent sessions.

Until the next reboot.

🔍 Where would I investigate this?

In practice, the behavior was narrowed down to Citrix Profile Management. Without CPM, the first logon after reboot worked correctly again.

One interesting lead points to:


HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\SessionInfo

1 2	HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\SessionInfo

This area can be persisted through the user profile and plays a role in session/Explorer behavior.

The resulting pattern is particularly easy to miss in MCS or PVS environments:

VDA reboots
→ First user logs on
→ Startup apps are missing
→ Second user tests
→ Everything works
→ The problem appears to have disappeared.

I find these issues interesting because a conventional Citrix smoke test can easily miss them.

💡 My takeaway

With Windows Server 2025, I would now deliberately test the very first user logon after an image update or VDA reboot.

Not just:

VDA registered ✔️
Logon works ✔️
Published app starts ✔️

But also:

Run keys ✔️
Startup folder ✔️
WEM actions ✔️
CPM/profile processing ✔️

Sometimes being the first or second user on a VDA makes a crucial difference.

⚠️ This is currently a finding from the field, not a general Windows Server 2025/CPM defect. I would not infer a general product regression from it yet.

Finding in the Wild | Citrix UPM – First Logon Fails, Second Logon Works

This week, I encountered an interesting issue with Citrix Profile Management (UPM) at a customer. After restarting the VDAs, various startup applications did not run during the first user logon. The symptoms: ❌ Applications from the Windows Run

This week, I encountered an interesting issue with Citrix Profile Management (UPM) at a customer.

After restarting the VDAs, various startup applications did not run during the first user logon.

The symptoms:

❌ Applications from the Windows Run keys did not start
❌ Shortcuts in the Startup folder were ignored
✅ Everything worked on the second logon
❌ The issue returned after a VDA restart

Initially, I focused on the usual suspects: GPOs, WEM, logon scripts and Windows Explorer.

But the actual cause was in the user profile.

🔍 What did I find?

During the investigation, the following registry key caught my attention:


HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\SessionInfo

1 2	HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\SessionInfo

It contains session-related information for Windows Explorer.

In the affected environment, Citrix UPM persisted this key in the user profile and restored it at the next logon.

This apparently carried over outdated session information that affected initialization of the startup applications.

🛠️ My solution

I excluded the registry key from profile synchronization in the Citrix UPM configuration.

Citrix UPM GPO:

Profile Management → Registry → Exclusion list

Added the following entry:

Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\SessionInfo

Next, I cleaned up the SessionInfo data already stored in the affected test profile and tested logon again.

The result:

✅ Startup applications ran again on the first logon
✅ The issue did not return after a VDA restart
✅ No changes to the applications themselves were required

💡 My takeaway

Not every logon issue is a problem with GPOs, WEM or Windows itself.

Especially in non-persistent Citrix environments, it is important to consider which registry information actually needs to persist between sessions.

In my view, session-related Explorer data does not belong in a permanently synchronized user profile.

I will therefore consider excluding Explorer\SessionInfo in my future UPM baselines, after assessing each environment.

⚠️ This exclusion is not a universally confirmed Citrix fix and should be tested before a production rollout.

Install new Microsoft Teams (version 2) in Citrix

The new version of Microsoft Teams (often referred to as “Teams 2.0”) has been the new standard since July 1, 2024.

For VDI environments, this means:

October 1, 2024 → End of Support (Classic Teams in VDI)
July 1, 2025 → End of Availability

In short:
There is no way back.

WEM Administration Console – Part 1 (Actions, Filters & Assignments)

Current version is Workspace Environment Management 2206.

Known problems

When VUEMRSAV.exe is used to display results on actions applied through an action group for the current user, the Applied Actions tab may display the wrong source of actions. [WEM – 20002]

WEM Administration Console – Part 2 (System Optimization, Policies & Profiles and Security)

Current version is Workspace Environment Management 2206.

In the following I will give an insight into the menu items System Optimization, Policies & Profiles and Security.

System Optimization

These settings are used to reduce resource usage on the host. They are used to free up resources and make them available for other applications, thereby increasing the user density per host.

While the System Optimization settings are machine-based and apply to all user sessions of a machine, the Process Optimization under CPU Management is user-based.

That is, when a process triggers CPU Spike Protection in user A’s session, the event is recorded and limited for user A only. When user B starts the same process, the behavior of process optimization is determined only by process triggers in user B’s session.