NetScaler Gateway 11 footer customization

Ran into difficulties customizing a new NetScaler 11 Gateway.  Although I was happy to finally be able to apply themes per NetScaler Gateway vServer, I quickly saw that this new option presents new challenges if you are looking to customize beyond what the themes allow.

Our goal was to add footer information on the front page in order to provide Help Desk contact info, a Citrix Receiver download link and the RSA Self Service portal.   With NS 11, the problem is that the index.html file is no longer constructed the same as it was with 10.x.

Lets understand this a bit more.

With NetScaler Gateway 11, the logon form and pretty much the entire index.html body, is generated by 2 javascript files (gateway_login_view.js and gateway_login_form_view.js).

1. gateway_login_view.js – creates the body and tables for the actual form
2. gateway_login_form_view.js – creates the form itself, username and password fields, domain dropdown box, etc.

This naturally creates a headache if you are use to working with the 10.x firmware.  As with 10.x you can accomplish most of the customization by directly modifying the index.html file, and creating a custom global policy user interface.  On the other hand, this presented a challenge if you had to run multiple Gateway vServers  with a custom UI, and you had to get pretty creative on how to overcome  it.

For NS 11, I read a post where someone was struggling with a similar situation, luckily it pointed me in the right direction.  The post suggested to modify or create a new gateway_login_view.js  and/or gateway_login_form_view.js (you can read the post here).  

Rather than modifying existing code or creating new files then having to deal with responder policies, etc.  I figure I try to do this via the NetScaler Rewrite Policies and Actions to make it look something like the picture below.

Environment:

• Citrix NetsScaler 11.0Build 63.16.nc
• StoreFront 3.0
• RSA 8.1

Let’s get started.

1. Add links at the bottom of the authentication page, unfortunately rewrite actions have a 255 character limit which you can easily bypass by adding “+” to the expression. Click here to view/download the syntax as WordPress messes with it.

2. Enable the EULA box by default:

add rewrite action ns_gtw_eula_checked_action replace_all “http.RES.BODY(120000).SET_TEXT_MODE(ignorecase)” “\”type=\’checkbox\’ checked\”” -pattern “type=\’checkbox\'”
add rewrite policy ns_gtw_eula_checked_pol “HTTP.REQ.URL.CONTAINS(\”gateway_login_form_view.js\”)” ns_gtw_eula_checked_action
bind vpn vserver portal_netscaler -policy ns_gtw_eula_checked_pol -priority 110 -gotoPriorityExpression NEXT -type RESPONSE

3. Enable the Logon Button by default:

add rewrite action ns_gtw_LogonAutoEnable_rw_act replace_all “http.RES.BODY(120000).SET_TEXT_MODE(ignorecase)” “\”\’disabled\’:\’\’\”” -pattern “\’disabled\’:\’disabled\'”
add rewrite policy ns_gtw_LogonAutoEnable_rw_pol “HTTP.REQ.URL.CONTAINS(\”gateway_login_form_view.js\”)” ns_gtw_LogonAutoEnable_rw_act
bind vpn vserver portal_netscaler -policy ns_gtw_LogonAutoEnable_rw_pol -priority 120 -gotoPriorityExpression END -type RESPONSE

Hope this helps 🙂

Disclaimer:

I do not accept any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, content, completeness, legality, or reliability of the information contained on this website.

Customizing Citrix NetScaler Gateway 10.5 logon page with Dual Factor Authentication

Following up on my instructions on how to Customize the new version of Citrix StoreFront 2.6.  Below is how you can create your own Citrix NetScaler Gateway customization package , and ensure your changes are not lost when the appliance is rebooted.

Environment:

• Windows 2008 R2
• Citrix XenApp 6.5 Hotfix Rollup Pack 2
• PVS 6.1.16
• StoreFront 2.6
• Citrix NetsScaler 10.5: Build 53.9.nc
• RSA for dual factor

Now in my case, we are utilizing RADIUS for secondary authentication.  After creating the AGEE site, make sure the site is set to “Green Bubble” under “NetScaler” “Global Settings” Change Global Settings” , then head over to the “Client Experience” Tab, and select “Green Bubble” under the “UI Theme”

Once complete, your site will look something similar to the picture below.

Now lets customize the following

• Logo
• First Authentication box
• Second Authentication box
• Fix Compatibility issues with Internet Explorer 11

Solution: (Connect to your NetScaler via WinSCP)

1. Copy the vpn folder from /var/netscaler/gui/ to your local desktop

2.  Edit “login.js” under /var/netscaler/gui/vpn to fix the “Password 1” entry

Around line 93

Replace

if ( pwc == 2 ) { document.write(‘ 1’); }

With

if ( pwc == 2 ) { document.write(‘ ’); }

3. Upload your company logo under under /var/netscaler/gui/vpn/media

4. Update “ctxs.authentication.css” under /var/netscaler/gui/vpn/css to update your logo and height and width where the logo will be placed

In my case, our company logo was bigger than the logo provided by Citrix. So I needed to modify the height and the width.

Around line 210

#logonbox-logoimage
{
background-image: url(“../media/company_logo.png”);
border: 0 none;
float: right;
height: 48px;
position: absolute;
right: 71%;
top: 80px;
width: 273px;
}

5. Update “en.xml” under /var/netscaler/gui/vpn/resources  to change “Password 2:” for the secondary authentication box

Around line 83:

Replace

<String id=”Password2″>Password 2:</String>

With

<String id=”Password2″>RSA Code:</String>

6. Fix the Internet Explorer 11 compatibility issue, the quick fix is to tell IE11 to use  compatibility mode, however you can force the NetScaler page to emulate IE v.9, you can read more about this under http://stackoverflow.com/questions/6771258/whats-the-difference-if-meta-http-equiv-x-ua-compatible-content-ie-edge-e

Edit index.html under /var/netscaler/gui/vpn

Under line 4 place

<META http-equiv=”X-UA-Compatible” content=”IE=EmulateIE9″ />

7. Upload your modified files and logo

8. Head over to your site and make any corrections.  once you are happy with the results, create your custom package

Open Putty and log in as nsroot, then type (Note the name of the compressed file, this needs to match “customtheme.tar.gz“)

• shell
• mkdir /var/ns_gui_custom
• cd /netscaler
• tar -cvzf /var/ns_gui_custom/customtheme.tar.gz ns_gui/*

9. Now apply the package to your AGEE sites

• In the configuration utility, under the Configuration tab, expand “NetScaler Gateway” and then click “Global Settings“.
• In the details pane, under Settings, click Change global settings.
• In Global NetScaler Gateway Settings, click the Client Experience tab.
• Next to UI theme, click Custom and then click OK.

10. Reboot the NetScaler and you will notice your changes are intact.