AppSense Environment Manager 8.0 Service Pack 2.0 has introduced some new Logoff functionality.
To enable all Environment Manager actions to complete on logoff and to prevent the logoff black screen from appearing on Vista and Server 2008, the Shutdown Windows API call is detoured.
This API call is called whenever a user logs off or shuts down the system. The detour allows Environment Manager to:
- Trigger Environment Manager logoff actions
- Prevent logoff continuing until all Environment Manager actions have completed
When Environment Manager actions are completed or a 60 second default timeout has been passed logoff continues allowing any remaining processes to shut down before Windows itself shuts down. You can override the default timeout by setting a millisecond value in the “LogoffActionWaitTimeout” registry key. Since Environment Manager has already completed its work, it will not be a cause of the Windows logoff black screen.
Whilst the Environment Manager logoff actions are taking place, the system is effectively stalled and the user may wonder what is happening. To alleviate their concerns, a custom screen can be displayed informing the user that Environment Manager is busy. The screen is activated when text for the screen is configured from within the Blocked Text Library.
Adding an entry to the Blocked Text Library with the Title Logoff Message will allow a custom message to be specified for display.
Note: Once logoff continues, Environment Manager has effectively finished for the user session, therefore no more Policy Configuration actions or User Personalization will take place. Additionally, if another application decides to misbehave at this point, the black screen may still appear for those applications.
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