Introduction
Workspot media redirection allows online meetings and other Web-based activities to take place on your local Client device instead of your remote Workspot desktop (or application server) for better performance. Cisco Webex, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, and Zoom are currently supported, along with any custom Web-based application you choose (that is, you can use it for non-media Web sites).
Note: The Workspot Media Extension is a different feature from Teams for VDI, the Teams Plugin, and the Zoom Plugin.
How Media Redirection Works
Media Redirection uses these components:
A Media Redirection Policy set in Control.
This is specified at the pool level on the “Resources > Cloud Desktop Pools > poolname > Edit” page or the “Resources > Cloud App Pools > poolname > Edit” page.
The Workspot Media Extension running on your Workspot desktop or application server.
The Workspot Media Extension browser plugin in your Edge or Chrome browser.
When the Media Extension is enabled in a Desktop Pool or Application Server Pool:
The Workspot Agent in the pool loads the Workspot Media Extension.
The browser extension component of the Media Extension is downloaded from workspot.com and installed on browsers on the Pool’s Desktops and App Servers.
This occurs for supported browsers only (Edge and Chrome at the time of this writing).
Installation takes place at browser startup.
With Chrome, a Chrome policy is installed to allow the extension to be downloaded from workspot.com instead of the Chrome Web Store.
With the help of the browser extension, URLs for meeting URLs are passed to the Workspot Client (on the Client-side device) instead of being launched locally (on the remote Desktop or Application Server).
A taskbar icon is optionally shown on the taskbar of the user’s Workspot Desktop as if it were running there and not in the local device.
Alternatively, the URL can be launched on the Workspot Desktop or Application Server in its default browser.
End-User View of the Installation
A notification will appear in a new browser tab announcing that the meeting will appear on your local device:
If you click “OK,” the meeting will run locally in your browser. If you click “Cancel,” it will run in your Workspot desktop/app. If you do nothing, the URL will not be launched at all.
Note: Connections that are opened directly by the target application, such as teams.exe, cannot be redirected. Thus, running the browser-based version of these apps is best for these.
Supported Configurations
Workspot Desktops/Application Servers
Chrome and Edge browsers on Workspot Windows desktops.
Browsers and Clients
Chrome and Edge browsers on Windows systems running the Workspot Windows Client.
Chrome browser on Chromebooks running the Workspot Web Client.
Limitations
A Web link must be seen by the browser for the process to work. For example, a meeting that is joined from inside teams.exe bypasses the system browser and is not redirected.
Meetings joined from the Zoom, Teams, etc. desktop apps running on the Workspot desktop will still work normally but may have the degraded audio/visual performance common to running such programs on virtual desktops.
The browser may not install Workspot Media Extension immediately (“lazy installation”). The installation can be forced by restarting the browser.
Changes to Control’s Media Redirection Policies or to which policy is attached to the pool are not noticed by the Workspot Agent until it restarts, which happens once every 24 hours and when the VM reboots.
Enabling the Workspot Media Extension
The Extension must be enabled in two places:
In a “Media Redirection Policy.”
On the “Add/Edit Pool” page of the desktop or application server pool.
Media Redirection Policy
The Media Redirection Policy sets which services are redirected. It is attached to desktop pools and application server pools individually, allowing different pools to use different policies.
Media Redirection Policy
Configuration
To configure media redirection:
Go to “Policies > Add a New Policy.”
Set the policy type to “Media Redirection".”
Give the policy a name.
Check the “Enable Workspot Media Redirection” box.
The “Redirect without prompting” option will prevent users from declining redirection. Use with caution.
Select “Redirected URLs” (do not use “All URLs except”).
For each predefined service you wish to redirect:
Click the “Enabled” box.
Leave “Client Application” at its default value, “Use System Browser,” if you want the URL to open in default browser of the user’s local system. Alternatively,
Select an existing Workspot Web Application that is defined with the same URL.
If available, select “Enable Taskbar Notification” to create a taskbar icon on the Workspot desktop. (This is available initially for Teams.)
Click “Add Policy".”
Note: Remember that none of this takes effect until the the user signs out from the desktop, the Agent restarts (once every 24 hours or upon desktop reboot), and the user signs in again.
Custom URL Redirection
You can also redirect the URLs of your choice to the end-users’ local devices, but only after you have saved the Media Redirection Policy.
Adding a custom URL to redirect
To edit the Media Redirection Policy and add a custom URL:
Go to “Policies > policyname.” This puts you in the “Edit Policy” page.
Click the “+” icon.
Then fill in the blank line with:
“Name” field: A name for this rule.
“URL” field: The URL to redirect.
“Enabled” checkbox: select to enable.
“Client Application” menu: Select “Use System Browser.”
“Enable Taskbar Notification” checkbox: Leave deselected.
Click “Save.”
Note: Remember that none of this takes effect until the the user signs out from the desktop, the Agent restarts (once every 24 hours or upon desktop reboot), and the user signs in again.
URL Format
The leading “http://” and “https://” in the URL are ignored.
A leading “*” (possibly after "http://” or “https://) indicates a wildcard. This is the only wildcard used unless “regex” is specified.
If the URL starts with “regex:” the rest of the URL is treated as a regular expression, using the syntax rules in https://github.com/google/re2/wiki/Syntax.
For example “regex:ac[mn]e.com” matches both “acme.com” and “acne.com,” in both “https://” and “http://” permutations.
Control will perform rudimentary syntax checking, but as always with regular expressions, test your work carefully.
Adding a Media Redirection Policy to a Pool
Go to the desired desktop pool or application pool using the pool’s “Add/Edit Pool” page.
Note: Remember that none of this takes effect until the the user signs out from the desktop, the Agent restarts (once every 24 hours or upon desktop reboot), and the user signs in again.
Note: “— Select —” is displayed on this page when “None” is meant.
"Policies” section of the “Add/Edit Pool” page.