Systinternals has a tool called “BgInfo”. With this tool it is possible to display content on a Windows desktop background. For example environment variable Information such as “computer name” and the “IP address” can be displayed. This can be very handy when testing or for people that do they support for the Windows environment.
VMware View 5.1 has the following environment variables available in a desktop session :
- ViewClient_Broker_DNS_Name
- ViewClient_Broker_DomainName
- ViewClient_Broker_Remote_IP_Address
- ViewClient_Broker_Tunneled
- ViewClient_Broker_Tunnel_URL
- ViewClient_Broker_URL
- ViewClient_Broker_UserName
- ViewClient_IP_Address
- ViewClient_LoggedOn_Domainname
- ViewClient_LoggedOn_Username
- ViewClient_Machine_Name
- ViewClient_MAC_Address
- ViewClient_Protocol
- ViewClient_Type
- ViewClient_Windows_Timezone
The View environment variables can be added to BgInfo using the custom field option.
After running BgInfo, the View environment variables are displayed on the desktop background. In the following example we added information on the desktop about what protocol (RDP or PCoIP) is used to connect to the View desktop:
Very nice idea! I would submit however that by default bgInfo only updates the wallpaper image and variables during a login, not during a reconnect. As a result, if someone reconnected with a different protocol, the wallpaper information could be incorrect. The only change I might make to this is using the “Desktop Info” app rather than bginfo, as it dynamically overlays and updates every few seconds as opposed to slapping the info on a copy of the wallpaper file.
Excellent idea, and cheers!