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March 13, 2025

Emergency Direct Desktop Connection Without Tenant

In an emergency situation where a tenant is down or unreachable but the network is still working, you can globally instruct the agent software on all of the desktops to allow temporary RDP native access so end users can connect without the broker being functional.

To enable this temporary functionality, add the registry keys described below to the desktop VMs, either directly or via GPO policy. Add the keys in one of the following locations, depending on whether the agent software is installed on a 32-bit or 64-bit Windows system:

  • HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Omnissa\Horizon DaaS Agent (for 32-bit)
  • HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Omnissa\Horizon DaaS Agent (for 64-bit)
KeyTypeValue
AllowDirectConnectionsDWORD 0 = do not allow direct connections 1 = allow direct connections.
DirectConnectionExpiryInUTCREG_SZDate and time until which direct connections are allowed if direct connections access is enabled (AllowDirectConnections = 1). Date and Time Format: YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS

This functionality requires the following:

  • The agent software is version 17.2 or later.
  • RDP access by the end users is not being blocked by Horizon View GPOs or any other GPOs.
  • The end users are in a group associated with a desktop assignment. When this functionality is enabled, the agent software configures the desktop assignment's specified users and groups for RDP access in the desktop's local RDP group.

Note: The default Group Policy refresh interval is 90 minutes. You have to perform additional steps to force a refresh sooner than that. See the relevant Microsoft documentation for more information.

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