Parallels Desktop Business Edition 12.0 User guide

Parallels Desktop for Mac

Business Edition

IT Administrator's Guide

Version 12

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Contents

Introduction ...............................................................................................................5

Parallels Desktop Business Edition Features Overview ...................................................... 5

Register a Subscription.............................................................................................7

Create a Parallels My Account........................................................................................... 7

Register a Subscription ................................................................................................... 10

View Licensed Mac Computers....................................................................................... 11

Export the Computer List to a File ......................................................................................... 13

Blacklist a Mac ...................................................................................................................... 13

Deactivate Parallels Desktop on a Mac.................................................................................. 14

Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition Features ...........................................15

Restricting User Actions in Parallels Desktop with a Custom Password...........................15

Restricting a Virtual Machine Configuration with a Custom Password.............................. 16

Locking a Virtual Machine on Suspend............................................................................ 18

Setting an Asset Tag in the Virtual Machine BIOS............................................................ 19

Using Custom Graphics and Links in the Control Center ................................................. 20

Hiding Developer's Features in Parallels Desktop GUI ..................................................... 21

Encrypting a Virtual Machine ........................................................................................... 22

Running Virtual Machines in the Background ("headless" mode)...................................... 23

System Requirements ........................................................................................................... 23

Configuring Virtual Machines to Run in the Background ........................................................ 23

Managing the Parallels Desktop Service ................................................................................ 25

Setting an Expiration Date for a Virtual Machine ..............................................................26

Resetting the Guest OS Password .................................................................................. 27

Creating Linked Clones ................................................................................................... 28

NetBoot Support for Virtual Machines ............................................................................. 30

Setting Up a Local Update Server ...................................................................................30

Installing a Web Server .......................................................................................................... 31

Creating the Parallels Update XML File .................................................................................. 31

Configuring Individual Macs................................................................................................... 33

Contents

Customizing the Request Support Option ....................................................................... 35

Participating in the Customer Experience Program.......................................................... 36

Parallels Desktop License Renewal ................................................................................. 36

Mass Deployment of Parallels Desktop and Virtual Machines

..............................38

Prerequisites ...................................................................................................................38

Supported Deployment Tools.......................................................................................... 39

Preparing Parallels Desktop Deployment Package .......................................................... 39

Adding Parallels Desktop Installation Image........................................................................... 40

Adding Virtual Machines ........................................................................................................ 41

Supplying a Parallels Desktop License Key............................................................................ 43

Changing Deployment Configuration Options........................................................................ 43

Deploying Parallels Desktop and Virtual Machines to Macs .............................................50

Deploying with Parallels Mac Management for Microsoft SCCM............................................ 50

Deploying with Apple Remote Desktop ................................................................................. 52

Deploying OS X Image Using NetBoot................................................................................... 56

Parallels Desktop Command Line Interface...........................................................57

Parallels Desktop Management ....................................................................................... 57

prlsrvctl Commands .............................................................................................................. 58

Virtual Machine Management .......................................................................................... 68

prlctl Commands................................................................................................................... 68

Index ........................................................................................................................96

Welcome to Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition. Built on the world’s best-selling, top-rated,

most-trusted solution for running Windows applications on the Mac, Parallels Desktop Business

Edition adds the capabilities that help IT administrators and purchasing agents save time and

money.

Note: This guide refers to version 12 of Parallels Desktop. If you are using a newer version of Parallels

Desktop (including updates), please download the latest guide from the Parallels website.

In This Chapter

Parallels Desktop Business Edition Features Overview .............................................. 5

Parallels Desktop Business Edition Features

Overview

With Parallels Desktop for Mac, your Mac users can seamlessly run both Windows and Mac

applications side-by-side with speed, control and confidence. Business users can experience as

much or as little Windows as they want. Multiple view modes make it possible for users to

customize the level of integration between Mac and Windows without compromising performance.

Best of all, IT can lock down, secure, and control the settings that matter most.

Parallels Desktop Business Edition Feature Highlights

• License management portal.

• Split license keys into sublicenses.

• Maintain corporate compliance with restricted virtual machines.

• Set an expiration date for a virtual machine.

• Run virtual machines in the background (“headless” mode).

• Mass deployment of virtual machines and management through Microsoft SCCM.

• Business-level support including 24/7 phone and email support options.

C HAPTER 1

Introduction

6

Introduction

Parallels Desktop Business Edition Feature Matrix

See how Parallels Desktop Business Edition compares to Parallels Desktop Pro and Standard

editions.

Feature

Standard

Pro

Business

World’s most powerful, best-performing solution for running Windows

applications on a Mac

•

Merge the coolness of Mac with the utility of Windows. Seamlessly utilize

Mac features inside Windows and leverage Windows' strengths on your

Mac.

•

Microsoft Visual Studio Plug-in. A Microsoft Visual Studio plug-in enables

rapid debugging of apps inside your VM.

•

Support for popular development, design, and test tools including Docker,

Jenkins, and Chef. Leverage popular productivity tools to reduce time

spent on development and testing.

•

Advanced networking tools. Create virtual networks for complex network

scenarios and testing, including simulating various network scenarios.

•

Mass deploy and mass manage Parallels Desktop and Windows VMs for

your employees.

•

Licensing and Support

Premium 24/7 phone and email support

First 30 days

•

Centralized license management via Licensing Portal

•

Simple deployment with unified volume license key

•

Customizable in-product “Request Support” option

•

Removed in-product notifications and third-party offerings

•

Configurable software update policy and local update server options

•

Security

Restrict end-users from changing virtual machine settings

•

Restrict end-users from creating new virtual machines

•

Create expiring virtual machines

•

Enforce USB device policies

•

Configurable policies via SCCM and Parallels Mac Management

•

After you purchase a Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition subscription, you must register it

in Parallels My Account. Read this chapter to learn how to create a Parallels My Account and how

to register a subscription.

In This Chapter

Create a Parallels My Account.................................................................................. 7

Register a Subscription ............................................................................................ 10

View Licensed Mac Computers ................................................................................ 11

Create a Parallels My Account

Parallels My Account is a web application that enables Parallels customers (consumers and

organizations) to view and manage licenses for various Parallels products. The instructions below

describe how to quickly get started with Parallels My Account.

You can create an account for your company or organization when you first create a Parallels My

Account, or after you already created a private account.

Create a Parallels My Account from scratch

If you are a new customer and don't have a Parallels My Account, you can create one for yourself

and for your organization as follows:

1 Visit Parallels My Account at https://account.parallels.com

C HAPTER 2

Register a Subscription

8

Register a Subscription

2 Click Register. The registration page opens.

3 Select the I represent a company or an organization option. This step is required to create a

business account for your organization.

4 Specify your personal and your company info (all fields are required) and click Create Account.

This creates an account for you personally and a business account for your organization to which

you are assigned as the account administrator. When you log in to your account using you email

address and password, you can manage personal and business products from the same account.

Creating a Parallels business account from an existing account

If you already have a personal Parallels My Account, follow these steps to create a business

account for your organization:

9

Register a Subscription

1 Log in to Parallels My Account using your email address and password.

2 Click

next to your user name to open a side menu. If the Dashboard page is not already

displayed, click Dashboard in the side menu.

3 On the Dashboard page, click Create a business account in the Quick Actions section.

4 A message box opens with an explanation of what a business account is. Read it and then click

Proceed.

5 In the Registering a Business Account dialog, type the name of your organization and then

specify your country, state/city (if applicable), ZIP or postal code, and your business phone

number.

6 When done, click Create a Business Account.

10

Register a Subscription

A business account is created for your organization to which you are assigned as the account

administrator. When you log in to your personal account, you can manage personal and business

products from the same account.

Register a Subscription

To register your Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition subscription in Parallels My Account:

1 Sign in to Parallels My Account using your email address and password.

2 Click

next to your user name to open a side menu. If the Dashboard page is not already

displayed, click Dashboard in the side menu.

3 Click the Register a license key link in the Quick Actions section. The Register a License

Key page opens.

You can also open this page by expanding Subscriptions and Licenses section in the side

menu, then clicking Corporate Subscriptions, and finally clicking the Register a License Key

link.

4 Type the license key that you received with your subscription and click Register.

5 When your license key is registered, you will see a confirmation message.

11

Register a Subscription

6 If you would like to view your subscription information, click the Open Corporate

Subscriptions button. This will open the Subscription Details page where you can view the

information.

Your subscription is now registered and your license key can be used to activate the Parallels

product to which it applies.

View Licensed Mac Computers

After you install and activate Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition on Mac computers, your

Parallels Account is updated with the information about these computers.

To view the computer information:

1 Open a side menu by clicking

next to your user name.

2 In the side menu, click Dashboard.

3 In the product box, click Manage corporate computers. The Corporate Computers page

opens.

12

Register a Subscription

You can also open this page by expanding Parallels Desktop for Mac in the side menu and

clicking Corporate Computers.

4 Select a subscription in the upper section of the page to display the computers that use its

license key. The computers are displayed in the lower section of the page.

• If your subscription has sublicenses, click the triangle icon in front of the subscription name

to display them, and then click a sublicense to see computers that were activated using its

license key.

5 You may need to scroll the computer list horizontally to see all columns.

6 Click the Show / Hide Columns drop-down menu and select or deselect columns. Columns

that are not selected will not show up in the list.

7 The Actions drop-down menu allows you to:

• Export the computer list to a CSV file.

• Blacklist a computer.

• Deactivate a license on a computer.

Read on to learn more about these actions.

13

Register a Subscription

Export the Computer List to a File

To export the complete computer table to a CSV file, click the Actions drop-down menu and select

Export all to a SCV file.

Blacklist a Mac

Blacklisting a Mac deactivates Parallels Desktop on it and makes it impossible to activate the same

Mac using the same license key. The only way to activate Parallels Desktop on a blacklisted Mac is

to use a different license key.

To blacklist a Mac, select it and then click Actions > Add to blacklist.

To view the list of blacklisted computers, click the View Blacklisted Computers link at the top of

the Corporate Computers page. The Blacklisted Computers page opens.

To cancel blacklisting of a computer, select the computer and then click Actions > Remove from

the blacklist. The computer can be activated again using the same license key.

14

Register a Subscription

Deactivate Parallels Desktop on a Mac

Deactivating a Parallels Desktop license on a Mac computer disables Parallels Desktop on it. To

deactivate a license, select a computer and then click the Actions > Deactivate.

Note: Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition will continue to run on the affected computer until the

computer checks in with the Parallels Licensing Server. This could be anywhere from a few minutes to

seven days. If you want to deactivate the license on a computer immediately, you can log into it and run

the following command in Terminal: prlsrvctl deactivate-license

This chapter describes the Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition features.

In This Chapter

Restricting User Actions in Parallels Desktop with a Custom Password .................... 15

Restricting a Virtual Machine Configuration with a

Custom Password ....................... 16

Locking a Virtual Machine on Suspend ..................................................................... 18

Setting an Asset Tag in the Virtual Machine BIOS ..................................................... 19

Using Custom Graphics and Links in the Control Center .......................................... 20

Hiding Developer's Features in Parallels Desktop GUI............................................... 21

Encrypting a Virtual Machine .................................................................................... 22

Running Virtual Machines in the Background ("headless" mode)

............................... 23

Setting an Expiration Date for a Virtual Machine........................................................ 26

Resetting the Guest OS Password ........................................................................... 27

Creating Linked Clones ............................................................................................ 28

NetBoot Support for Virtual Machines....................................................................... 30

Setting Up a Local Update Server ............................................................................ 30

Customizing the Request Support Option ................................................................ 35

Participating in the Customer Experience Program ................................................... 36

Parallels Desktop License Renewal........................................................................... 36

Restricting User Actions in Parallels Desktop with

a Custom Password

As an administrator of Parallels Desktop Business Edition, you have the ability to restrict the

following user actions in Parallels Desktop:

• Creating a new virtual machine.

• Adding an existing virtual machine.

• Removing a virtual machine.

• Cloning a virtual machine or converting it to a template.

• Opening the Parallels Desktop Preferences dialog.

C HAPTER 3

Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition

Features

16

Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition Features

This functionality allows you to set a custom password and specify which user actions from the list

above should require it. Once you apply these settings, even the local Mac administrator will not be

able to perform these actions without specifying the password that you set.

To set the password and specify the actions:

1 In the Parallels Desktop menu bar, click Parallels Desktop > Preferences.

2 Click the Security tab.

3 Click the Restrict user actions with password: Turn On... button.

4 In the dialog that opens, type a custom password. This becomes the password that will be

required to perform actions that you will select in the next step. Click OK.

5 Back in the Security dialog, select the user action(s) you want to restrict.

6 Close the dialog to apply the settings.

If a Mac user now tries to perform any of the actions that were password-protected (e.g. creating a

virtual machine, etc.), they will be required to enter the password. To select or deselect an action in

the Parallels Desktop Preferences dialog will also require the password.

The steps described above allow you to set the password and restrict user actions in Parallels

Desktop on a particular Mac. If you want to apply these settings on multiple Mac computers in your

organization, you can do it using the mass deployment process. For more information, please see

Mass Deployment of Parallels Desktop and Virtual Machines (p. 38). Specifically, these options

are set in the

Security section of the deploy.cfg file, as described in Changing Deployment

Configuration Options (p. 43).

Restricting a Virtual Machine Configuration with a

Custom Password

Parallels Desktop Business Edition provides you with the ability to protect the configuration of a

virtual machine with a custom password. When a password is set, a Mac user will be required to

enter it in order to modify virtual machine settings.

Using the Parallels Desktop graphical user interface to set the password

To set a password in the Parallels Desktop graphical user interface:

1 Open Parallels Desktop and select a virtual machine.

2 On the Parallels Desktop menu bar, select Actions > Configure to open the virtual machine

configuration dialog.

3 Select Security.

4 Click the Prevent changes to settings: Turn On... button.

17

Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition Features

5 Enter the password, then enter it again to verify and click OK.

To change or remove the password:

• To change the password, click Prevent changes to settings: Change Password, then enter

the old and the new passwords.

• To remove the password, click Prevent changes to settings: Turn Off, then enter the current

password to remove the configuration lock.

If the password is set and the user tries to view or modify the virtual machine configuration, they will

be required to enter the password.

Using the command line utility to set the password

In addition to the graphical user interface, you can use the prlctl command-line utility to set,

reset, and view the password protection of a virtual machine.

To set the password, type the following command in Terminal:

prlctl set "vm_name" --password-to-edit

where vm_name is the virtual machine name in quotes.

You'll be asked to enter a password and then confirm it.

Please enter a new password:

Please confirm password:

To change or remove the password, type the following command:

prlctl set "vm_name" --password-to-edit

where vm_name is the virtual machine name in quotes.

You'll be asked to enter the current password.

lease enter current password:

You will then be asked to enter and confirm a new password. To remove the password, leave the

line blank and press Enter twice (when asked to enter and confirm the password).

Please enter a new password:

Please confirm password:

To view the current protection status, type the following command:

prlctl list "vm_name" -i

The output will look similar to the following:

Encrypted: no

Edit restricted: yes

18

Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition Features

Using the mass deployment process to set the password

If you are mass deploying Parallels Desktop and one or more virtual machines, you can set the

password in the deploy.cfg file. The password will be applied to all virtual machines included in

the deployment package.

For more information, please see Mass Deployment of Parallels Desktop and Virtual Machines

(p. 38). Specifically, the password is set in the Virtual Machines section o

f the deploy.cfg file

using the vm_password_to_edit parameter, as described in Changing Deployment

Configuration Options (p. 43).

Compatibility with Other Parallels Desktop Versions

The described functionality works only in Parallels Desktop 7 or later. If you set a password in a

virtual machine and then open the virtual machine in an earlier version of Parallels Desktop, the

protection will NOT work (i.e. the user will be able to view and modify the virtual machine

configuration).

You can only set or remove the password in Parallels Desktop Business Edition. However, if the

password is set and the virtual machine is opened in the Parallels Desktop Standard Edition, the

password will continue to work (i.e the virtual machine configuration will remain locked).

Locking a Virtual Machine on Suspend

To avoid possible security and privacy issues, a suspended Windows virtual machine can be

completely locked from user interaction and viewing. When this option is enabled and a virtual

machine is suspended, the Windows desktop in the virtual machine window (and in the Parallels

Desktop Control Center) is replaced with a black background and the Windows session is

interrupted. When the virtual machine is resumed, the Windows session is remained locked and the

user will have to enter their user ID and password to unlock it and to see the Windows desktop.

To enable or disable this option:

1 In OS X, open Parallels Desktop and select the desired virtual machine (e.g. the source virtual

machine when preparing it for mass deployment).

2 On the Parallels Desktop menu bar, select Actions > Configure to open the virtual machine

configuration dialog.

3 Click the Security tab.

4 Depending on your needs select or clear the On Suspend: [ ] Always lock Windows option.

5 Close the dialog.

Note: The On Suspend: [ ] Always lock Windows option is available only for virtual machine running

Windows with Parallels Tools installed. For all other virtual machines, the option will be hidden.

19

Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition Features

Setting an Asset Tag in the Virtual Machine BIOS

Asset tags help identify, control, and track computer assets in an organization. Parallels Desktop

for Mac Business Edition provides the ability to set an asset tag in the virtual machine BIOS, which

can then be read using the standard tools of the guest operating system. You can set an asset tag

using the Parallels Desktop graphical user interface or the prlctl command line utility that comes

with Parallels Desktop.

To set an asset tag using the Parallels Desktop GUI:

1 On the Parallels Desktop menu bar, select Actions > Configure to open the virtual machine

configuration dialog.

2 Select Business.

3 Use the Asset tag field to specify the desired tag.

To set an asset tag using the prlctl command line utility, use the following syntax:

prlctl set ID|name --asset-id tag

where ID|name is the virtual machine ID or name, and tag is the asset tag to set.

To obtain the asset tag in Windows, use the WMIC.exe command:

WMIC SystemEnclosure get SMBIOSAssetTag

For the complete syntax of the WMIC utility please see the Microsoft documentation.

Once set, the asset tag never changes. Even if you perform such virtual machine operations as

cloning, template manipulation, registering, or any other, the asset tag always stays the same. If

you do want to change an existing asset tag for any reason, you can do it manually using of the

methods described above.

20

Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition Features

Using Custom Graphics and Links in the Control

Center

Parallels Desktop Control Center is a part of the Parallels Desktop graphical user interface. It's a

window from which a Mac user launches virtual machines. By default, the Control Center displays

the list of the available virtual machines, as in the following example:

You can customize the Control Center by specifying a URL to your own HTML document, which

will be embedded at the top of the Control Center window. The HTML page can contain text,

graphics, and links such as your company logo, some custom text, a link to a support page, etc.

The HTML document format doesn't have any specific requirements.

The URL must be specified during the preparation stage of the Mass Deployment process (p. 38).

Specific

ally, you need to specify the URL string and the HTML page size using the following

variables in the mass deployment configuration file (deploy.cfg):

• control_center_banner_url

• control_center_banner_height

• control_center_banner_min_width

For the description of how to specify the variables and their values, please see Changing

Deployment Configuration Options (p. 43). The

variables are described in the Virtual Machines

section.

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Parallels Desktop Business Edition 12.0 User guide

Parallels Desktop Business Edition 12.0 User guide

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