1. Fractalia Manager
White Paper
Functional and technical description
V 5.2.2
13/04/2010
Fractalia Software

2. Document properties
Document name Fractalia Manager White Paper
Version V 5.2.2
Date 13/04/2010
Author Product Management Department
Contents Functional and technical description of Fractalia Manager
Project 0000-FRS-TEM
Keywords Fractalia Manager, IRS, P2P, Workstation Management
Total number of pages 24
Distribution control
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3. Contents
1 Introduction ............................................................................... 1
1.1 About Fractalia Software ............................................................. 1
1.2 Support service ......................................................................... 1
1.3 Key points ................................................................................ 1
2 Functionalities ........................................................................... 3
2.1 Reactive support ........................................................................ 3
2.1.1 IRS: Instant Recovery System ............................................. 3
2.1.2 Intel vPro ......................................................................... 3
2.1.3 Fractalia Remote Assistance: ............................................... 4
2.1.4 Remote control .................................................................. 4
2.2 Proactive maintenance ................................................................ 4
2.2.1 Terminal group management............................................... 4
2.2.2 Hardware and software inventory......................................... 5
2.2.3 Massive distribution of P2P software ..................................... 5
2.2.4 Patch detection ................................................................. 5
2.2.5 Access control and Security policies ...................................... 6
2.2.6 Instantaneous operations.................................................... 6
2.2.7 Events.............................................................................. 6
2.3 Added-value services .................................................................. 6
2.3.1 Report Server ................................................................... 6
2.3.2 Anti-fraud protection .......................................................... 7
2.3.3 Fractalia Business Intelligence ............................................. 7
3 Technology................................................................................. 8
3.1 Architecture .............................................................................. 8
3.2 Server ...................................................................................... 9
3.3 Agent ..................................................................................... 10
3.3.1 Fractalia Manager agent ................................................... 10
3.3.2 Instant Recovery System .................................................. 10
3.3.3 Software distribution ........................................................ 11
3.3.4 Remote control ................................................................ 12
4 System requirements ............................................................... 15
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4. 4.1 Server side ............................................................................. 15
4.1.1 Hardware requirements .................................................... 15
4.1.2 Software requirements ..................................................... 15
4.2 Client side ............................................................................... 16
4.2.1 Hardware requirements .................................................... 16
4.2.2 Software requirements ..................................................... 16
4.3 Connectivity typology ............................................................... 16
4.3.1 Connection between server and client ................................. 16
4.3.2 Connection between clients ............................................... 16
4.4 Required bandwidth ................................................................. 17
5 Installation procedure .............................................................. 18
5.1 Analysis and/or definition of the communication network ............... 18
5.2 Possible alternatives for installation in client computers ................. 18
5.2.1 By means of remote software distribution tools .................... 18
5.2.2 Without remote software distribution tools .......................... 19
6 Conclusions .............................................................................. 20
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5. 1 INTRODUCTION
1.1 About Fractalia Software
Fractalia Software is an IT research and development company, a leader in the
development of robust and effective solutions for managing and controlling large
computer networks. Fractalia Manager is a revolutionary solution for the centralised
management of large groups of computers that ensures a maximum level of
operation whilst minimising costs. Large companies and organisations have put
their trust in our solution, providing their business with a new concept of remote
management for computer networks.
1.2 Support service
Fractalia Manager is designed for companies that provide centralised services of
reactive and proactive support, either for MSPs (Managed Services Providers) or for
internal use.
Reactive support
• The remote and instantaneous solution of problems of PC availability (any
SW problem).
• The possibility of providing SLAs on managed PCs.
• The reduction of visits to clients’ homes/offices.
• The automation of tasks to reduce response and repair times.
Proactive support
• IT management by group/company policy.
• Automated assistance and fine tuning (SW and application distribution,
equipment inventorying, remote execution of commands…).
• It prevents future problems and enhances the user’s experience.
• Reporting tools, reports and “self-service” solutions for final users.
Added-value services
• Commercial information on the use of PCs, applications and associated
devices.
• Remote blocking/unblocking of PCs.
• Virtualised applications.
1.3 Key points
• Operating systems:
o Windows (W2K, WXP, Vista, W7, Wmobile).
o Linux (Ubuntu, OpenSUSE).
o Mac OSX.
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6. • Any network connectivity (Internet, intranet, VPN, ADSL, 3G…). Changes are
not needed in the client’s network/security, and it works through firewalls
and HTTP proxies. Connectivity is always outbound (HTTP protocol) from the
agent to the server.
• Multicompany environment: one server allows providing differentiated
services to multiple companies.
• Disaster recovery: it allows providing PC operation guarantees (SLA on
software failures).
• Theft control: Remote PC blocking.
• No need for local servers at each remote site, no middleware.
• Semiautomated remote deployment.
• Ideal for environments of wide geographic dispersion.
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7. 2 FUNCTIONALITIES
According the IT Services provided, Fractalia Manager is divided into the following
modules:
2.1 Reactive support
Task automation, disaster recovery and remote diagnosis.
2.1.1 IRS: Instant Recovery System
Total recovery after SW failures.
The Instant Recovery System (IRS) technology is characteristic of Fractalia
Manager and allows -working at a very low level (at sector level)- setting hard drive
restore points and returning to a previous known state. Both actions -setting a
restore point and restoring to a known state- can be performed either locally or
remotely, individually or massively, on a group of terminals.
The process of setting a restore point takes only a few moments and does not
interfere with the user; in addition, it uses very little hard drive resources because
it does not make a full copy of the hard drive.
It is possible to set multiple restore points. This technology allows having total
control over the state of a group of distributed terminals since the possibility always
exists of returning to a known restore point in which that piece of equipment works
properly.
2.1.2 Intel vPro
Integrated with HW management (iAMT).
PCs with Intel VPro and Centrino Pro processor technology for laptops provide
exceptional performance for demanding computer tasks, being ideal for professional
environments. The main functionalities of VPro with Fractalia Manager are:
• Remote control of BIOS. Settings, access, the possibility of changing the
username and password that are initially entered in the BIOS of the AMT,
etc.
• It allows redirecting PC start-up to a disk image or a floppy- or CD/DVD-type
removable device, enabling the execution of hardware diagnosis to identify
possible problems in the client equipment, using to this end a VT100 or ANSI
emulation and different key translations.
• Remote-control access to the Instant Recovery System console, it being
possible to restore a PC that does not start up without the need for visits or
user interaction, the piece of equipment being restored to an operational
state in the shortest time.
• Enterprise mode: integration with Active Directory and encrypted
connections.
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8. 2.1.3 Fractalia Remote Assistance:
Automation of Service Desk tasks.
A remote assistance system where the user of a terminal can request online
support such that an operator connects his/her terminal to provide the help
required. The use of Fractalia Remote Assistance is advantageous with regard to
the use of other systems such as telephone assistance or control remote (VNC and
the like):
• Bandwidth use is much lower than in a desktop-sharing video session.
• The assistance session is conducted within a secure virtual network that
ensures direct IP visibility.
• The Fractalia Remote Assistance operator’s interface makes assistance
easier for the operator, allowing him/her to execute predefined solutions in
the assisted terminal aimed at fixing specific incidents, shortening the times
needed to perform support tasks and reducing the experience needed by an
operator in order to be effective.
• Fractalia Remote Assistance allows obtaining information about the terminal
and executing commands without having to use the shared desktop, only at
the command level, which speeds up the operator’s work.
• Fractalia Remote Assistance records all actions carried out by an assistance
operator in order for them to be subsequently audited.
2.1.4 Remote control
It allows the remote access to terminals and interacting with the desktop. It is fully
integrated with the solution and its technology is based on the Ultra Virtual Network
Computing (UVNC) protocol.
The remote control can be started by the network administrator or at the request of
a user with problems in his/her terminal.
This tool allows enabling the need for access permits by the final user and
automatic access without acceptance by the user (for unattended kiosk or PC
environments).
As an additional advantage, the Fractalia Manager platform allows remotely
controlling this equipment without having to open inbound ports in the final
network elements such as routers, firewalls, etc.; it even allows establishing remote
connections with terminals protected by an HTTP proxy.
2.2 Proactive maintenance
Terminal group oriented administration that allows to fully control the pool of
clients.
2.2.1 Terminal group management
Fractalia Manager allows managing terminals based on Companies for
multicompany setups and on groups for each company. It allows integration with
corporate directories (Active Directory) or the use of your own structures.
Terminals can also be grouped into “dynamic groups" according to different criteria,
which allows grouping terminals according to temporary operational criteria:
terminals with a hard-drive use above a certain level, terminals that lack certain
security software item, etc. This enables the operator to act faster against potential
threats, omitting the phase of searching for terminals through the different nodes
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9. of a mixed tree according to non-transitory operational criteria (the geographical
area of a PC, a department within a company, etc.).
2.2.2 Hardware and software inventory
It is an extremely comprehensive tool that provides very accurate information on
the hardware components of the equipment and the software applications that have
been installed.
It is a detailed inventory that allows obtaining reports and filtering such that
terminals that meet certain requirements are selected so as to perform actions on
them (setting restore points, distributing software, etc.).
It warns of the changes that have taken place in both the software and the
hardware and allows knowing at all times the state of the group of terminals.
2.2.3 Massive distribution of P2P software
It is a fundamental module in a solution for the remote management of terminals.
It allows distributing, updating and installing applications, updates, patches,
hotfixes and, in short, software packages in a massive and unattended manner.
It uses technology -currently in the Peer-to-Peer (P2P) patent phase- that
segments each software package into fragments that are shared amongst the
terminals that make up the group of PCs (peers) in the same local area network
(LAN).
This technology enables Fractalia Manager to be a highly scalable solution since the
bottleneck constituted by the downloading of packages from a server or from
middleware networks is no longer a critical point.
The entire communication protocol is HTTP encapsulated (firewall transparent) and
supports proxies, which allows the solution to behave in a correct and versatile
manner in highly heterogeneous networks.
The software distribution solution periodically checks that the SW packages
assigned to each terminal are properly installed, correcting any differences found
(programme uninstalled by the user, etc.) and generating the necessary events in
the platform.
Self-service software
A utility so that the users themselves can choose applications and install them in
their workstations. Fully integrated with Fractalia Manager, the administrator
chooses which applications will be public and viewable for each PC and the user
selects those he/she considers appropriate.
When it is time to choose, said applications are assigned by the platform to the PCs
and downloaded, installed and so on as just other packages, becoming added to
reports, events, etc.
2.2.4 Patch detection
For Windows clients: terminals are catalogued by their hardware and software and
automatically receive the appropriate Windows, Office, Acrobat and other updates
depending on the group they belong to.
Patch detection uses all the power and technology of massive software distribution,
integrating it with “Windows Update Services” servers.
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10. 2.2.5 Access control and Security policies
It supervises the health of terminals, deploys critical security actions and generates
events and alarms. It can interact with the hard-drive protection module (IRS)
when it is necessary to return to a known point.
It controls and manages access to certain websites for user groups as well as the
execution of certain applications. It also allows restricting the execution of
application whitelists and blacklists at the kernel level.
It allows access filtering of families of peripherals external to the devices and the
input/output ports of the computers.
2.2.6 Instantaneous operations
This tool allows assigning operations to the terminals and allows carrying them out
immediately. It allows the remote and massive execution of operations, commands
and scripts ordered by the central platform.
2.2.7 Events
The event report shows the logs of the different actions taken by the server or the
client’s agent.
The types of events that can be received are:
• Generic event: information on the start-up of the machine is received.
• Inventory event: information on the actions of the IRS assigned to a
terminal is received.
• Instant Recovery System: information on the actions of the IRS is received.
• Remote updates: information on the status of the updates is received.
• Remote control: information on the remote control actions is received.
2.3 Added-value services
Functionalities that allow providing new services to Fractalia Manager clients.
2.3.1 Report Server
A new server for providing web-based reports to final users. Predefined reports on
inventory, SW distribution and application use. It allows providing direct reports to
clients without using the computers’ management tool.
Predefined reports allow obtaining information on:
The total number of managed terminals:
An overall list of terminals
Detailed inventory of SW and HW of the terminals
SW packages distributed:
List of SW packages distributed to the terminals
Number of terminals with each package assigned
Number and list of packages for each terminal
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11. Use of applications
A list of the applications installed and used by users in the client’s network.
A list of URLs browsed by users (by activating the whitelist and blacklist
function).
2.3.2 Anti-fraud protection
Remote PC blocking.
It verifies that the activity of the Fractalia Manager agent is normal in order to
ensure its performance is correct in the managed terminal. Should a user want to
make inappropriate use of a terminal and thus interrupt the communication
between the Fractalia Manager agent and its server (e.g. by using the terminal
exclusively offline), Poison Pill would block the terminal such that it could only
become operational again by the intervention of the Fractalia Manager operator.
Similarly, Poison Pill guarantees the operator the possibility of blocking any given
terminal at any given time, and the terminal object of such blocking can only be
made operational again by the operator’s own intervention, as in the previous
scenario.
2.3.3 Fractalia Business Intelligence
The search of patterns in large terminal networks such that they may be used as
input in a technical or strategic decision making chain.
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12. 3 TECHNOLOGY
3.1 Architecture
Fractalia Manager operates on any network architecture, both for fixed
terminals behind any type of network (including private networks, the
Internet, fixed IPs, dynamic IPs, etc.) and roaming terminals. Whenever the
terminal browses the Internet (HTTP access to the management server), it
will have the totality of Fractalia Manager’s functionalities at its disposal, even
in the case of going through intermediate elements (firewalls, proxies). The
Peer-to-Peer distribution system provides an efficient use of network
resources (at both the LAN and the WAN level).
ESPAÑOL INGLÉS
ENTORNO DE RED INTEGRAL INTEGRAL NETWORK ENVIRONMENT
FRACTALIA MANAGER MÓDULOS FRACTALIA MANAGER MODULES
The Fractalia Manager console uses smart-client technology, so it makes use of
client-server development advantages but avoids the problems associated to
usability and quality of use, as a console that can be run locally. Likewise, it
maintains its own directory but can be synchronised to directory systems existing in
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13. the market and can even work with dynamic groups established according to
specific queries.
Fractalia Manager is easy to deploy and allows almost automatic massive
installations. The simplicity and usability of its design allows obtaining good
performance of its functionalities from the first day it is installed. Its use
significantly reduces the total cost of usage of a PC throughout its lifetime.
The server side of Fractalia Manager consists of the following logical machines: a
database server and a web server. Said machines can be assembled over Windows
SQL and IIS architectures respectively. The open architecture enables easy
integration with other systems and the development of specific reports.
3.2 Server
The Fractalia Manager server controls and manages workstations over the Internet.
Access to the platform is over the Internet, whereupon the administrator can gain
access by using a web browser and an Internet connection and, if necessary,
security credentials.
The different functions of the servers (which can be located in independent physical
machines or in a single machine depending on the desired capacity) are:
 Agent web server:
For managing PC terminals.
Remote agents only use HTTP/HTTPS protocols for connecting to the server.
The "polling” frequency can be platform-configured in order to attain a large
capacity with a minimum use of resources. This server allows configuration
in high-capacity, high-availability mode.
 Operator web server:
A server for platform management. It allows accessing the operator’s “smart
client”. It is usually located together with the agent web service.
 Presence server (“Remoting”):
A server to maintain continuous communication with the terminals. It allows
running remote operations in an immediate manner.
The configuration or not of the “presence” use is also carried out from the
central platform, and said configuration can be changed at any time. If the
presence is activated, the agents constantly maintain a bidirectional
HTTP/HTTP connection to the server, which allows sending commands
immediately to the terminals.
 Remote control server (“Repeater”):
A server for interconnecting the operator and the remote agent over the
Internet.
When the user or the operator starts a remote control connection, both
connect via this server, the connection ending as soon as the assistance
session ends. All communications are carried out via HTTPS from the remote
agent and over a specific port (configurable by the operator).
 Database server:
An SQL server with the data needed for the platform operation.
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14. 3.3 Agent
ESPAÑOL INGLÉS
PILA DE APLICACIONES APPLICATION STACK
SERVIDOR FRACTALIA MANAGER FRACTALIA MANAGER SERVER
CLIENTE FRACTALIA MANAGER + IRS FRACTALIA MANAGER CLIENT + IRS
CAPA FRACTALIA MANAGER FRACTALIA MANAGER LAYER
CAPA IRS IRS LAYER
3.3.1 Fractalia Manager agent
On the client side, the Fractalia Manager layer is in charge of ensuring that the
contents are properly downloaded and that the actions ordered from the server are
carried out.
The agent-server connection is carried out by means of “polling”, with a frequency
that can be configured at the individual or group level from the platform (from
minutes to several hours).
The agent contains different functional modules to cover the necessary recovery
services, instantaneous operations, software updates, etc.
3.3.2 Instant Recovery System
A capability for protecting and recovering the information and system, which is a
key tactical point in every organisation. Instant Recovery System completely
recovers the entire partition of a hard drive and discards all types of changes made
by the user (software installation, configuration changes, virus-caused damage,
deleted files or directories, changes in the Windows registry, etc.).
Functionalities:
• One or more protected partitions.
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15. • Once the Terminal system has been recovered, any following changes will be
undone.
• The recovery process takes some seconds and is carried out when the
terminal restarts the system or as a scheduled task. This uses around 5% of
the capacity of the hard drive.
• Instant Recovery System consists of a local application in the event that
corporate policies allow users to set their own recovery points so as to
return to previous restore points.
The protected partition is just an area on the hard drive that is protected de facto
by the Instant Recovery System module, and any changes will be automatically
discarded during the restart of the equipment when indicated by the operating
mode.
The user’s common files (data) partition is not protected between changes, and at
most 10% of its capacity is used to store the recovery points. The protection of all
changes should not be lost after a restart.
The data partition will not be required, but is advisable for corporate offices or
workstations where the user needs storage space.
Figure 3. Instant Recovery System
3.3.3 Software distribution
The software distribution module will allow remotely updating and installing
software at a workstation or a certain group without needing to use additional
resources of a piece of equipment of the network and is based on the Peer-to-Peer
protocol within the local network, no security configuration in WAN networks being
required.
Each terminal shares all downloads, either at the same moment of downloading a
portion of the package or after a full download. This allows saving bandwidth at the
remote sites when it is necessary to install an update on several terminals.
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16. The possible settings of a terminal can be any of the following modes:
 P2P over LAN. The terminal does not connect directly to the server; it
needs another terminal in “act as proxy for other peers” mode for the latter
to communicate with the server and subsequently send the former the
requested package.
 Direct to the server. The terminal directly communicates to the server and
does not need an intermediate terminal to receive update packages.
 Acting as proxy for other peers. It carries out the “mirror” action when it
sees that a terminal in “P2P over LAN” mode is requesting an update; it
makes the request to the server and then sends it to the terminal that was
requesting it.
Figure 5. Software distribution
By default, a terminal always acts as a “peer” in the LAN and also communicates
directly with the central server.
3.3.4 Remote control
This module is used for the remote control and management of any workstation in
the network in an efficient, organised and exhaustive manner. It is used for
purposes of online technical support and assistance for users. It allows taking
control of the screen, keyboard and mouse of a remote user over a VNC session so
as to solve the problem or to show the user how something specific works. There
are three ways of taking remote control according to the configuration of the
network and the existence of firewalls, NATs, proxies or any other type of
restriction in the user network or the administrator network.
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17. Direct: it is used to connect with terminals within the same LAN as the operator’s
or within different networks provided that there is appropriate mapping of public
IPs: public port to private IP, private port in the network elements.
Clients have a VNC server listening over one port. When the remote control is
executed over another terminal from a computer with access to the Fractalia
Manager platform, a direct connection is established between both.
It can happen that there is a router between the “viewer” device and the
“controlled” device. In this case, it is necessary to map the router ports to make a
direct connection. In this situation, is not advisable to use the connection in direct
mode.
Direct mode
Normal: It is used in those cases where no type of inbound port can be mapped or
the terminals do not have fixed IPs.
Clients have a VNC server listening over a port but they also have the capacity to
send “VNC video” as an outbound connection to any machine prepared to receive it.
Additionally, a machine is located in a network without port-mapping restrictions.
Said machine will consist of two applications:
 Remoting. The Remoting application is in charge of getting the remote-
control request in touch with the appropriate client. The following open a
permanent outbound TCP socket with the Remoting port of this machine.
The remote-control requests by the IRM platform arrive at this same
port.
When it decides over which machine the remote control is being
attempted, the application indicates the former to start sending “VNC
video” to this machine over the “Server” port.
 Repeater. The only thing this application does is to get the “VNC video”
it receives over the “Server” port from the client in touch with the
“Viewer” port, which is where the COM operator’s viewer attacks
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18. Normal mode
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19. 4 SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
Each instance of the Fractalia Manager software installed is capable of working
with small networks of less than 100 PCs to large corporate networks of
hundreds of thousands of PCs.
The hardware and software requirements needed to implement the solution are
shown in the following sections.
4.1 Server side
4.1.1 Hardware requirements
Minimum* < 10,000 terminals From 10,000 to 25,000 From 25,000 to
terminals 100,000 terminals**
Web (x1) (x1) (x1) (x2)
application
server
Processor Pentium Pentium Xeon Pentium Xeon Pentium Xeon
Core2Duo
RAM 1GB 2 GB RAM 4 GB RAM 4 GB RAM
Hard drive 20 GB 120 GB 120 GB 120 GB
Database (x1) (x1) (x1) (x1)
server
Processor Pentium Pentium Xeon Pentium Xeon Pentium Xeon
Core2Duo
RAM 1 GB MB 2 GB RAM 4 GB RAM 4 GB RAM
Hard drive 20 GB RAID 1 SCSI RAID 1 SCSI RAID 1 SCSI with 2
with 2 120 GB with 2 120 GB 120 GB hard drives
hard drives hard drives
* This setup is the machine that makes the system run with a reduced number of
PCs. Here, the web application server and the database server can be the same
physical machine.
** Web servers are array assembled, whereas database servers are cluster
assembled in order to balance requests.
In case of requiring “Presence” (remoting), it is advisable to assemble independent
servers (having the same characteristics as web servers), in the ratio of one server
for every 50,000 PCs.
All servers can be virtualised.
4.1.2 Software requirements
Web server(s) will need the following basic software:
 Windows 2003 Server Standard Edition or above.
 Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 installed.
 Internet Information Server 7.0 installed.
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20. Database server(s) will need the following basic software:
 Windows 2003 Server Standard Edition or above.
 Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 installed.
 Microsoft SQL Server 2005.
4.2 Client side
4.2.1 Hardware requirements
The minimum hardware settings of an equipment for it to be capable of
running Fractalia Manager are the following:
 Processor: 1,8 GHz Celeron D
 RAM: 256 MB (recommended: 512MB)
 Hard drive: 2 GB of free space
 Network card (Ethernet or WI-FI)
4.2.2 Software requirements
 Windows 2000 (SP4), XP (SP2, SP3), Vista and W7 operating systems; Linux
operating systems: Ubuntu 9.04, OpenSUSE.
 Microsoft .NET Frameworks 2.0 installed, or Mono for Linux versions.
 NTFS partition for using IRS.
4.3 Connectivity typology
From the standpoint of connectivity, there are two different interfaces: the
connection between server and clients and the connection between clients
themselves for P2P content sharing.
4.3.1 Connection between server and client
The network connection between the server side and the clients is supported on
any type of network that supports the HTTP (or HTTPS) protocol over TCP/IP.
Generally, the connectivity between server and clients can be established over: the
Internet, extranets, local area networks and virtual private networks. Fractalia
Manager allows managing roaming terminals (users changing from network to
another: corporate network to the Internet) as long as the server is “visible”.
4.3.2 Connection between clients
In order to enjoy the full power of Peer-to-Peer distribution between clients when
downloading contents, it is necessary for them to see each other directly.
Therefore, there will be the following networks: local area networks and virtual
private networks.
These networks must allow HTTP communications over TCP/IP.
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21. 4.4 Required bandwidth
The following tables shows scaling of the server-required speed in order to proceed
to the downloading of contents from the central server:
The following premises have been set to calculate the server-required speed:
 An average size of 10 MB for the contents to be downloaded.
 The contents are updated daily during the night (with the network fully
downloaded).
 The sites have a connection with the server of at least 1 Mbps. This connection
is more than enough to download 10 MB during 8 hours at night.
BANDWIDTH ESTIMATE FOR DOWNLOADS AT MULTIPLE SITES
Size of contents (MB) 10
No. of sites 200 500 1000 5000 10000
Total size of server download (MB) 2000 5000 10000 50000 100000
Download time (night-time) (hours) 8 8 8 8 8
ADSL speed at sites (Mbps) 1 1 1 1 1
Required speed at server (Mbps) 0.6 1.4 2.8 13.9 27.8
It is worth highlighting that the greater the number of sites, the greater the
bandwidth required on the server side. Nevertheless, for a reasonable number of
sites, the bandwidth necessary at the server is easily assumable by means of
dedicated hosting.
Within each site, the distribution of contents is carried out by means of the P2P
protocol between all computers involved.
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22. 5 INSTALLATION PROCEDURE
Despite the complexity of the implementation of a new software solution in any
corporate environment, the installation of the Fractalia Manager solution is not
invasive and is easily adaptable to any environment.
Fractalia Remote Systems recommends following the installation steps indicated
below.
5.1 Analysis and/or definition of the communication
network
Before installing the solution it is necessary to ensure that the communication
network meets the minimum characteristics described above:
 Connection speeds in the client and server.
 Allowing the exchange of information by means of HTTP over TCP/IP. It is
therefore necessary to allow connectivity in the entire network over the port
configured in the server. Verify whether it is necessary to configure the proxy
agents to access the server and to know the credentials thereof.
 According to needs of the company, analyse whether there should be a single
central server controlling all sites or a server that controls one or a number of
sites.
 Prepare an agent with the desired configuration (server URL, browsing
configuration and credentials, if necessary).
5.2 Possible alternatives for installation in client
computers
The installation of the Fractalia Manager solution consists of two differentiated
parts:
 The installation of the remote management platform on the central server(s).
 The unattended installation of the Fractalia Manager agent on the client
computers. This agent is responsible for periodically querying the server to
download new contents and play them once the system's idle time has been
exceeded.
For implementation in a corporation, the critical point is precisely the installation of
the software in all client computers in a fast and efficient manner. Possible
alternatives for the installation of the Fractalia Manager agent are indicated below.
5.2.1 By means of remote software distribution tools
The following options make the remote and unattended installation of software
easier without the need for any operator to interact with the piece of equipment at
the time of installation.
Active directory
If the terminals are integrated in a directory such as Microsoft's Active Directory,
the features included in this type of tools for distributing and installing software can
be used.
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23. Software installation tools of the company itself
If the company has any software distribution tool such as SMS, Tivoli, etc., it may
opt for distributing the Fractalia Manager agent’s installation file by means of these
tools.
Fractalia LAN Installer
Fractalia Remote Systems can provide the company its own tool for the massive
installation of software by means of a probe.
This tool is capable of discovering PCs in a provided range of PCs knowing the
administrator login and password of each piece of equipment and installing any
type of software in a remote and unattended manner.
It is valid for LAN environments (including over VPN) or “full IP visibility” networks.
5.2.2 Without remote software distribution tools
The following options are valid for companies that do not have tools or a directory
for the remote distribution of software and do not know the administration
credentials of their PCs.
In these case, it is required that someone manually run the installation programme
on each PC.
Distribution via e-mail
By using e-mail it is possible to have users collaborate in the distribution of the
software to the entire organisation.
 Attached application: It is possible to distribute an e-mail message with an
attached executable file and request the recipients to proceed to install it.
 Web download application: The e-mail message can just include a link to a web
address with the executable file; said link must be accessed and the “Run”
button on the Windows dialogue box pressed.
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24. 6 CONCLUSIONS
Fractalia Manager is a platform for the remote control administration, control and
maintenance of distributed microcomputing systems, allowing the industrialisation
of IT services.
It ensures equipment stability as well as application availability at all times.
It guarantees the correct use of the applications installed on the equipment.
It maintains hardware and software inventories constantly updated.
It increases the productivity of both terminals and users, significantly reducing
down time.
It reduces the complexity of administering and managing the network of terminals.
It allows eliminating on-site assistance in case of software problems.
It optimises helpdesk resources and reduces the costs associated with the
maintenance of information technology.
It allows to simultaneously provide services to different companies, the possibility
of generating different types of permits at the read/write and modular levels and
the option of creating dynamic groups.
It allows controlling bandwidth to prevent the use of all network resources when
downloading starts in a terminal.
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