Understand App Volumes Markers

A marker is a label that you set on an application package so that entities can receive a package by its label in addition to a specific package version. With custom markers, you can define additional, multiple markers in App Volumes Manager. This capability allows you to manage entitlements entirely through marker assignments in addition to having both marker and package assignments.

Note: The CURRENTmarker continues to be available.

Custom markers are defined at the App Volumes Manager instance level, which means that a marker you create is available to every application and package in that instance. You then set one or more markers on individual packages.

You can use custom markers to indicate different versions of an application. These versions can be intended for different purposes or teams or groups. For example: A UAT marker can be set on a package to indicate that the application version is under user acceptance testing whereas a PROD marker can be set on a version to indicate that this is ready for production and can be consumed by everyone.

For information about creating and managing custom markers, see Create a Custom Marker in App Volumes Manager.

Properties of a marker

Every marker has the following properties:

• Name

  Used to identify the marker in App Volumes Manager and when displayed to end users. A marker name is limited to 32 characters, is case insensitive (can have uppercase or lowercase characters), and cannot contain spaces. The only special characters allowed are the underscore _ and dash -.

  • Marker name must be unique within an App Volumes Manager instance and is case-insensitive.

  • Marker names can be specified in English only.

• Color

  App Volumes Manager uses the color to display the background and text color of the marker.

• Description

  Optional text to describe what the marker is used for.

• Priority

  Determines the position of the marker in the marker order. Priority is used to resolve application delivery when an entity receives more than one marker assignment (indirectly through Groups or OUs). For more information, see Order of Precedence for Assigning App VolumesApplications.

Considerations for using custom markers

• A package can have a maximum of 5 markers, including CURRENT.

• Within an application, only one package can be set with a given marker.
  The same marker remains unavailable when setting a marker on another package for the same application.

• A marker cannot be deleted when any package or assignment is still associated with the marker.
  The marker must be first removed from the package or assignment and then can be deleted.

• Custom markers are not available for applications delivered as published applications on demand and applications entitled in Azure Virtual Desktop. The packages for these applications continue to use the CURRENT marker only.

Behavior of a custom marker during synchronization

Note the following behavior during application synchronization:

• For markers to get synchronized to the target instance, ensure the following:

  • Both the source and target App Volumes Manager instances must run the same App Volumes version.

  • Synchronize Markers, an existing control setting must be enabled.
    For more information about this control setting, see Register an App Volumes Instance as a Target.

• The name, color, description, and priority of a marker are synchronized to the target instance.

• Markers are matched between the source and the target instances by marker name.

• Markers that are synchronized from a source instance are read-only in the target instance. These markers can be edited or deleted only in the source instance.

• If a marker name in the target matches with that in the source, then all other properties of the marker in the target are updated to match the marker in the source after synchronization.

  • If the marker in the target is not present in the source, then the priority of the target instance marker is automatically reassigned to the lowest order after synchronization.
    For example: UAT is a marker with priority as 1 in the target instance, but not present in the source. The source instance has a marker TESTING with priority as 2. After synchronization, TESTING gets the priority as 1 whereas UAT is reassigned the priority as 2.

• Markers are first synchronized and then followed by assignments. It is mandatory to enable marker synchronization for a successful assignment synchronization. If a marker fails to synchronize to a target instance then any assignment associated with that marker also fails to get synchronized.
  For example: UAT is set on a package in the source instance and assigned to an entity test user. The target instance does not have UAT and test user. If marker synchronization fails, then both UAT and test user fail to synchronize to the target instance.

Characteristics of the CURRENT marker

The CURRENT marker has the following characteristics:

• Present by default in App Volumes Manager and cannot be renamed or deleted

• Can be used to indicate the latest package version of an application

• Has the lowest priority in the marker order
  Note: If an entity is assigned to a custom marker (higher priority than CURRENT) and a CURRENT marker but the custom marker is not set on a package and the CURRENT marker is already set on a package, then the package with the CURRENT marker is delivered to the entity.

• Only one package in an application can be set as CURRENT.

• This marker is now maintained at the App Volumes Manager instance level rather than at the package level.

Where markers are displayed

App Volumes Manager displays the markers that are set on a package in the Packages summary page, package details page, Packages and Assignments tables in the application details page, Assignments page, and the Users page within the DIRECTORY.

Depending on the page, the marker assignments are either listed in the Markers column or Target column which also contains package assignments.

Marker information delivered to end users

When an entity receives multiple packages which might be set with multiple markers, the version selection window displays these markers against each application version assigned to the entity. For more information about the version selection window presented to end users, see Understanding Multiple Assignments.

The marker information that an endpoint receives depends on the App Volumes agent version. With App Volumes agent 2609 and later, the version selection window displays the name and colors of each marker. In earlier versions, the marker information is CURRENT only.