1.2 Manually Preparing Applications for Virtualization

Most commercial applications, including GroupWise and Novell OpenOffice, require complex combinations of file system and registry entries to function properly. To facilitate virtualization of these applications, ZENworks Application Virtualization creates snapshot application installations and automatically configures itself based on modifications made to the host system during application setup.

Snapshotting uses images of the host machine that are taken at different points in time to determine the virtual application configuration.

Prior to installing the application to be virtualized, a snapshot is taken that captures the state of the host device without the target application installed. After installing the application, a second snapshot is taken that captures all changes to the host device. ZENworks Application Virtualization then computes the changes, or delta, between the snapshots, and inserts these changes into the configuration.

You can use the configuration information to create executable files that behave differently, depending on the application you are preparing to use: