It's been a while...

A long time since I posted last. It's been a long time too, since I last built a Citrix farm, but even though the name's changed and we're three versions on from the last time I built one, the good bits about the install are still good and the bad bits are still crap. Although I think we can add the main GUI for the install list to the bad pile: it looks like Mr Citrix's three year old got hold of the crayons.

One of the other niggles I've always had with Citrix has been building the new farm directly onto SQL during the install process, and I can report that hasn't changed. It doesn't seem to matter how careful I am setting up and testing ODBC connections, even whether or not I set the ODBC connection up using the SA account (not recommended, just out of experimental curiosity to see if it was a rights issue) - I'll always get an error.

And when you get that error, you'll get it again if you try and confirm the farm membership using CHFARM, at least if you go straight from a failed SQL install to another attempted SQL install. The solution here's to run CHFARM, set up a local Access based farm, then run the CHFARM operation again, having first taken care to flatten your SQL database. I don't know why it should be that way - it just always has been...