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We have an issue where we cannot find our remote workers' Linux (ThinStation OS) thin clients' IP addresses. Our people work at 4 remote facilities and remote into an RDS cluster in our data center (3 load-balanced RDS/TS servers, all are running Windows Server 2008 R2). We can see their MAC addresses and the ThinStation hostname, but since our DNS & DHCP servers are all Windows and we do not allow insecure DNS updates, the hostnames are not getting tied to DNS A-records. We cannot make static A records for all the thin-clients. Not only is it logistically impractical, they all use DHCP by default and we cannot set that many reservations. Worth noting, Windows Task Manager (as Admin) > Users > Remote Control: Session (ID) remote control failed. This happens (edit: only with clients with 2x monitors) and there does not seem to be a way around it. Additionally, we need to be able to VNC to the OS of the thin-client as well, not just the user's RDS sessions.

What we have been doing as a workaround is RDP'ing to a dedicated Windows workstation at each site and running Netscan and/or CMD: ARP -A to find the IP of the ThinStation by MAC, then remoting to it (via VNC). Does anyone know of a VNC console or something that could allow us to see the originating host IP of the clients from the sessions in the RDS servers? I know ServerFault isn't about recommending programs as solutions, but that actually may be just what we need. Thank you.

KidACrimson
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    `DNS & DHCP servers are all Windows` - Adjust your DHCP servers so that the DHCP create the DNS records? It an option in the scope properties. – Zoredache Mar 01 '17 at 21:18
  • Also, when you say you are only seeing the MAC address, where exactly are you seeing the mac? What interface? I believe if you search there are powershell/wmi commands you could run to get the list of RDP sessions that include the actual client IP. http://serverfault.com/questions/342533/wmi-object-to-get-current-sessions-with-client-name – Zoredache Mar 01 '17 at 21:22
  • Thank you, I will see if it's possible to allow our Windows DHCP servers to create the DNS records, but I was under the impression that requires insecure updates (since the clients are Linux, not Windows), which we can't allow. – KidACrimson Mar 02 '17 at 01:55
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    `the impression that requires insecure updates` That isn't true, but it does require some configuration. See https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd334715(v=ws.10).aspx – Zoredache Mar 02 '17 at 01:57
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    The MAC address gets hard-coded into the hostname of ThinStation OS at imaging, before deployment. We are able to see the hostnames in Task Manager > Users > Client name on the RDS servers. So, Windows _does_ get the hostname of the clients, just not the IP. – KidACrimson Mar 02 '17 at 01:58
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    Why can't you create that many DHCP reservations? Surely once the initial config has been done, the maintenance overhead would be relatively low? If the MAC address is known before deployment, could a step to add a reservation not be added to your (pre-)deploy process? – iwaseatenbyagrue Mar 02 '17 at 14:47
  • Thanks. Hypothetically we "can" create the reservations, it's just that it'd be a ton of logistical headache and is very much not ideal for two reasons: 1. DHCP is done by the IAD/router at each site (Adtran, Juniper, etc). and 2. As such, we have to get our ISP to put in the reservations and I have seen leases expire before they do so...it's just a ton of headache. – KidACrimson Mar 02 '17 at 20:52

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