Hello!
If I think about the ‘most wanted’, I always think of the westerns. The man with no name, or Mr Charles Bronson doing his stuff. The modern version is the top ten most wanted: FBI most wanted.….What has that got to do with NetScaler?
I’m glad you asked..
I was talking with Customer C recently, when we got to the main topic of discussion, I was surprised that something that I had already posted several times was not ‘Top of Mind’ for the customer. It got me thinking.
Don’t you read the NetScaler Times every week, would that not make you better informed anyway? It does by the way!
What are the ‘NetScaler’ Top ten most wanted(new features)?
Sometimes I get asked for ‘Roadmap’ sessions, the thing is, if you have not been living and breathing NetScaler all year (who does that Andrew?) you might have missed something important. Yikes!
Obviously, everyone is busy, possibly my latest newsletter or even checking back previous editions might require some leg work. This sounds like something that I should cover….
The Top 10 features added recently.
Certificate update automation! NetScaler instances running build14.1-34.x and later
No way! We have released a new copy of NetScaler Console that includes Certificate automation. Certificates are such a pain to manage manually, Certificate lifetimes are only getting shorter.
Click this link to read more!
NetScaler Console Security Dashboard, NetScaler 14.1-21.xx and later
A dashboard? How can that be exciting? This one will rock your world! It includes a security scanner that scans your application and tells you what needs securing. Once it has scanned the application identified the infrastructure components it event has the ‘deploy me button’ to push the settings on to the NetScaler. On-premise NetScaler Console
Click the link to read more!
Reordering the package engines: NetScaler release 14.1 build 21.57
Have the NetScaler WAF module check the authentication request before it hits the auth module! If you just upgraded this would not have been enabled on your config!
Click the Link to read more
Steven Wright’s template deployments for various gateway setups!
How can you get a guy with 14 years Citrix Consulting Service experience come and deploy your NetScalers for you? Oh, and did I tell you he maintains them too! Things change, you need to tap into this!
Click the Link for the latest LDAP deployment
Enhanced features in NetScaler VPX Express license, 14.1-29.63 and later.
A free license that has all the Premium features for testing! A 20meg limit, but handy to get some testing in.
Click the Link for the docs link
Option to edit GSLB parameters, 14.1-29.63 and later.
You can now change the following parameters of GSLB configuration entities:
Site name of service and service group. For more information, see Configure a GSLB service and Configure a GSLB service group.
Parent site of a GSLB site. For more information, see Parent-child topology deployment using the MEP protocol.
IP address (public and private) of a GSLB site. For more information, see Configure a basic GSLB site
DNSSEC : Automated Signature rollover and Zone Transfer
Ensuring that DNS is not spoofed is a no brainer.
Click here for the docs link
Cisco Duo Integration, NetScaler 14.1-29.x
Duo Universal Prompt based integration wherein 1st Factor is LDAP and 2nd Factor is OAuth. The NetScaler calls out to the CiscoDuo cloud service, very cool.
Docs link to read more
New nFactor visualiser, 14.1-29.x
NetScaler introduces the latest nFactor visualizer. The latest visualizer is an enhanced version of the old visualizer. It provides a new look and feel, and is more intuitive than the old visualizer.
The latest visualizer supports the following features:
You can build a prototype of your nFactor flow even before you configure its related entities such as policies, login schema, and authentication virtual server.
The View nFactor option is available on the Authentication Policy page of the UI (Security > AAA - Application Traffic > Authentication Virtual Servers > Authentication Policy). This displays a summary of the nFactor flows that you create. For the flows previously configured using the GUI or CLI, NetScaler automatically displays them on the latest visualizer.
When creating the flow, you can name the entities of the nFactor flow at any stage. This functionality is not supported in the old visualizer.
SSL Offload support for Intel QAT cards! NetScaler 14.1-xx
I know what you are thinking, I NEED TLS PERFORMANCE for my virtual appliances!!! Slap in a Intel QAT card into a server with a hypervisor and pass it through to the VPX. Either than, or buy UHMC and just through some vCPU cores and memory at the problem. Scaling isn’t a problem.
Docs link
Summary
Hopefully, there are things that help you out. Drop me a note if there are questions, andrew.scott@cloud.com.