KB43938 - Pulse Connect Secure (PCS) support for Citrix Workspace launcher

This article provides information on supporting launching Citrix Storefront using the Citrix Workspace launcher through Pulse Connect Secure using the rewriting engine.




 

With the deprecation of the NPAPI plugin (with most modern browsers), Citrix has decided to introduce a new mechanism called Citrix Launcher to launch remote desktop sessions and applications from the browser when leveraging the Citrix Workspace, previously called Citrix Receiver.

The changes introduced into the workflow are not compatible with Pulse Connect Secure rewrite profiles for Citrix Storefront (excluding HTML5 access), therefore enabling this workflow on the Storefront back end or attempting to use it through rewrite access will result in the sessions not getting launched.
 

Due to the recent changes, Citrix Workspace launcher workflow has changed related to download and launching of the ICA files when communicating with Citrix Storefront. Because of this, the ICA file does not get properly processed through the rewriting engine.

Pulse Secure is actively investigating the code changes necessary to support the Citrix Workspace launcher workflow with the rewriting engine access. Please continue to monitor the following KB for further status updates.
 

Workarounds:

1. This issue is only applicable to the desktop version of Citrix Workspace/Citrix receiver. HTML5 version can be used as an alternative connection mechanism within Citrix.
2. Disabling this workflow in the Citrix store will result in the ICA file being accessed and processed correctly, however since the browser cannot leverage the NPAPI plugin, the file will be getting downloaded instead and the user will have to double click the file to start his session.
3. Utilize a L3 VPN tunnel to access the Citrix Storefront environment with Pulse Secure Desktop client.