Clients

Clients are the largest organizational units in an Automation Engine system. They define self-contained environments that you can configure to depict your business as best suits you. Only an administrator of the client 0 (system client) can add or edit Client objects. The Clients page of client 0000 lists all clients of your Automation Engine system.

Tip: You may need to work with many objects, lists and monitors simultaneously. To make your work easier, you can open them in different browser windows and arrange them side by side on your screen. For more information about this and other useful functions, see Opening and Arranging Multiple Views.

Object Definition

This page includes the following:

For an example of how to use Clients, read Example: Creating a Basic Client/User Landscape, a Use Case where we describe how to set up a system with Client 0 and other two Clients, how to create User Groups and Users in Client 0 and assign them the rights they will need and how to move Users from Client 0 to the Client on which they will work.

Overview

One common way to configure your Clients is creating one per operational area, department, etc. For example, Client 1 for DEVELOPMENT (containing all developer Users are and the folders and objects they will have to work with), Client 2 for HR OPERATIONS (with all HR Users as well as their folders and objects), Client 3 for FINANCE OPERATIONS, etc. Another possibility is creating one Client per customer, or per type of customer.

No matter how you decide to set up your Clients, bare in mind that Users within a Client may open and work with all the folders and objects in that Client unless you define and manage their authorizations and privileges.

Multiple clients share the same Automation Engine instance on the same hardware, but do not access the same data.

Each client is uniquely identified by a four-digit number between 1 and 9999. When you log in, you must log into a specific client.

System Client

Client 0 (also called system client) is already available when you install the Automation Engine. You use it to manage system-wide settings (login information, calendars, variables, create and maintain other clients, users and user groups, etc.).

When you first log in to the client 0 you can use the UC/UC user object with password UC. Change this password immediately after your first login.

Only administrators can change or extend system client settings. All other clients and users with admin rights for numbered clients are created in the system client.

Some of the system client's internal objects can be overwritten when you update your system to a newer version and are, therefore, no longer available afterward.

Numbered Non-system Clients

All clients other than the system client (client 0) are referred to simply as clients. Non-system clients are numbered between 0001 and 9999. If you have the required authorizations you can also change some client settings locally (in the client itself). However, you can change a numbered non-system client's number only from the system client 0000.

Some of the objects that are supplied by the system client can be overridden by objects of the same name from a numbered non-system client. Therefore, you can define settings for each numbered non-system client which differ from the system client.

Clients List

The following columns are displayed by default:

The following columns are also available:

For more information, see Showing and Hiding Columns.

In the toolbar, the buttons Export and Refresh are available by default. These buttons allow you to refresh the content of the table and export it as a CSV file.

Defining Clients

A Client definition is made up of the following pages:

Clients can be added, edited, activated or deactivated in the Client 0 only, both from the Administration and from the Process Assembly perspectives. Once created, the Client is moved immediately to the corresponding environment. You can edit it either from the Administration perspective in client 0 or directly from the Process Assembly of the Client you have just created (it is stored in <No Folder>).

Note: The Client object cannot be moved out of <No Folder> because it is the base for all other objects within the Client and must be always at root level.

To Define a Client Object

  1. In Client 0 open the Explorer in the Process Assembly.
  2. Click the Add Object button in the toolbar or right-click anywhere in the list and select Add Object to open the list of available object types.
  3. Select Client (CLNT) and click the Add Object button. The Add Client dialog is displayed.
  4. Enter a number between 1 and 999 in the Client field.
  5. Optionally, enter a Title. It should be short and descriptive to help you easily recognize the client.

  6. Click the Add client button. The client is created and moved immediately to the corresponding environment. The Client page is displayed.

    Define the following settings:

    • TimeZone

      It will apply to all tasks processed in the client for which no specific time zone is defined.

      If you do not enter a value here, the UTC of the Automation Engine applies.

      For more information, see Time Zone (TZ).

    • Monitoring

      Activate this checkbox if you want to initiate the SNMP monitoring of this client.

      For more information, see SNMP Support.

    • Additional info

      Any text that you deem appropriate regarding MIB monitoring.

As soon as you create the client it is moved to its environment. You can edit, start, stop it, or open its report or execution data from the Administration perspective.

Working with Clients

Right-click the client to open the context-menu and access the available functions. On the toolbar you find buttons that provide quick access to some of them.

Note: It is also possible to select more than one client and right-click to perform a bulk operation.

Enabling/Disabling Automatic Processing

After creating a Client, it is deactivated. You can define objects, design Workflows, and so on, but you cannot execute them. To be able to execute objects, you must first activate the Client. To do so, right-click it and select GO - Enable Automatic Processing. From then on, tasks can be processed.

The Client status changes immediately. You see whether automatic processing is activated or not in the in the Active column of the list of Clients in the Administration perspective.

You deactivate one or more Clients by right-clicking it and selecting STOP - Disable Automatic Processing.

Deleting or Copying Clients

Clients cannot be deleted or copied via the Automic Web Interface. For this purpose, you need the AE DB Client Copy utility.

For more information, see AE DB Client Copy.

Opening the Report

For more information, see Reports for Clients.

Accessing the Historical Data

For more information, see Execution Data.

See also: