Step by Step – Install Microsoft RDS Licensing on Windows Server 2016

This blog post is part of a series covering the installation and configuration of Citrix XenApp 7.13 on Windows Server 2016.

This is the manual part were we are doing a next, next, I agree walk-through for all of you that are new to Citrix XenApp or want to see what changed in the installation from previous versions.

Today we are going to install one prerequisite that we need for our Citrix environment – Microsoft Remote Desktop Services Licensing.

In smaller environment I typically tend to install the Microsoft Licensing component on the same server as the Citrix Licensing Server. The bigger the environment the more likely you will have separate systems for infrastructure component installation.

If you want to have an overview of High Availability for RDS deyploments you should check this Technet article. You also find the following statement regarding the other options of fault tollerance you might think about…

There are two deployment configurations that are not supported:

Clustering RD Connection Broker servers on RD Virtualization Host servers.
An active-active RD Connection Broker installation.

To install it you need to switch to the Servermanager and start the Add Roles and Features Wizard. Click NEXT.

Choose Role-based or feature-based installation. Click NEXT.

As we are on the server were we want to install RDS Licensing click NEXT.

In the next screen scroll down to Remote Desktop Services and place a checkmark left to it. Click NEXT.

In the next screen leave everything untouched. Click NEXT.

NEXT.

Now place a checkmark left to Remote Desktop Services Licensing. Click Add features in the opening window.

In the next screen click NEXT.

Everything we need is now selected and ready for installation. Click INSTALL.

You can watch the progress if you like or grap a cup of coffee ;-). But be quick it won´t take long.

After the installation finishes click CLOSE.

And for today we are finished with this installation-quicky.

The following Windows Roles and Features were installed:

• DisplayName : Remote Desktop Services
• DisplayName : Remote Desktop Licensing
• DisplayName : Remote Differential Compression
• DisplayName : Remote Server Administration Tools
• DisplayName : Role Administration Tools
• DisplayName : Remote Desktop Services Tools
• DisplayName : Remote Desktop Licensing Diagnoser Tools
• DisplayName : Remote Desktop Licensing Tools

I hope this blog post helped you a bit. In a later one we will configure RDS Licensing.

Cheers,
Sinisa