I am a new user to F5's BigIP. I have created a webtop where users can access the MS RDP by clicking on the button. All windows users can access this but when a mac user logins to the page he does not see this button for RDP. I am trying to find out if it is possible to have Mac users access the RDP using the webtop or any other way. I know the Mac users will have to download the windows RDP client on their machines but how can I invoke it to launch automatically when they click on the RDP link. Please let me know. Thanks in advance to all the gurus.

Hi Amit, Not sure if it helps you, but using an app tunnel to the terminal server works very well with mac. Will not auto launch, and there are a few more clicks for the user but it does work. swoodley

I tried the App tunnel but when the Mac users login they do not see any link for the App tunnel. COuld you explain how it works or how I can get it to work. I had the Apptunnel in a webtop along with L3 VPN option.

I assume when you had the app tunnel configured it was shown within the 'resource assign' within policy editor? If this is enabled it should be visible when a mac user logs on to the webtop. The only thing mine didn't do was to launch the remote desktop on the users machine. This had to be launched manually but I could then see the traffic passing over the tunnel when connecting to the correct RDP server. I had it configured very simply, app tunnell to a specific IP/Hostname on 3389. This was associated within policy editor to the resource assign, then a full webtop. That was it.. Seems a bit odd if the app tunnel is not shown on the webtop.

The App tunnel did show up in the Resource Assign list in the Policy Editor. I can see it if I login thru windows but I do not see any icons when login thru MAC. I am on version 11.0.0 Build 8131.0 Hotfix HF1.

I apologise if I am barking up the wrong tree in advance, but do you have a server side check for Client OS? Is it possible that the request is going to a different ending? How does your policy editor look? Logon Page > Auth > Resource Assign > Webtop (etc etc... ) I am about to go home for the evening as I have already done a full day but will look at it (from a mac) a little later...

RDP on Mac | DevCentral

balderdash
Nimbostratus
Dec 20, 2011
got it to work using Network access from the webtop so no edge client needed to be installed on the mac. Just need to get it to auto launch now!
balderdash
Nimbostratus
Dec 20, 2011
got it to work using Network access from the webtop so no edge client needed to be installed on the mac. Just need to get it to auto launch now!
balderdash
Nimbostratus
Dec 20, 2011
got it to work using Network access from the webtop so no edge client needed to be installed on the mac. Just need to get it to auto launch now!
O2hitman_109315
Nimbostratus
Jun 05, 2012
I seem to be having the same issue. At first I thought it might be browser related, so I install firefox on my MAC...No good.

It seems to be MAC related.
John_45699
Nimbostratus
Feb 20, 2013
Anyone have a fix for this? I'm trying to get app tunnels to work with Mac OS X and the app tunnels just don't show up. They show up fine in Windows.
Mike_Finney_119
Nimbostratus
Aug 27, 2013
Seems that this is still an issue simply (not) displaying the links on a given webtop when connecting from a Mac client versus a Windows client. I have tried Safari, Firefox, and Chrome, but none of them will display the links which are immediately visible for the same users when accessing the webtop from a Windows machine.

I can understand that certain features may not work across every platform, but to not even display the links?? What could possibly be the reason for this massive fail of basic HTTP functionality? At this point I am putting the blame squarely on F5, for utter lack of communication. The problem may be on Apple, but more communication is needed from F5 here.
Mike_Finney_119
Nimbostratus
Aug 27, 2013
Thanks for replying, most appreciated. Unfortunately, the problem at this point is that the Safari, Firefox, and Chrome browsers on the Mac all refuse to display the link on the webtop, so the type of link isn't being checked yet. They just get an empty webtop no matter what I have tweaked or changed, so there is nothing for them to click on.
Hamish
Cirrocumulus
Aug 27, 2013
It'll display if you use the Java RDP. However you need to tweak things a bit as the Oracle JVM has a rather nasty bug that means the Java RDP won't work if you can't resolve your own FQDN to an IP (Doesn't have to be right... Just has to resolve. Go figure).

H
ehinkle_104407
Nimbostratus
Aug 27, 2013
Mike,

Do you have the Java Client selected on your RDP app tunnel?

Hamish,

it seems to resolve because it actually makes the connection into the remote pc when using the FQDN. The problem is after about 30 seconds the RDP session hangs and then after about 4-5 minutes the RDP session ends. When using IP, it works great. I am planning to open a support call to see what the issue is using FQDN as that is the way we prefer since we are not using static IP's.
- Mike_Finney_119
  Nimbostratus
  Aug 27, 2013
  I do have the Java checkbox enabled there, and I was able to just see it on one of our Mac's users machines after re-doing the policy changes again, for whatever reason this time it worked so the icon was there at least. Exactly the same things I did a little while ago, but....okay. It didn't work when he clicked on it, but that is another issue for a different day. At least I saw the icon this time. I will try the direct IP config in there shortly to see if that helps, but I suspect that in the end it won't matter as our Mac users also tend to be the ones who need a full network tunnel, so limiting them to an RDP icon might not work anyways.
travis99_94012
Cirrus
Aug 29, 2013
FQDN working for me. Latest Java running and allowed to run on our portal site. Getting Java to run can be a pain. You may check to make sure you aren't running a version of Java being blocked by Apple.