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Web Access Clients

by Canto

The Web Access Clients extend access to Cumulus catalogs, metadata and files to users on the Web. Using the same permissions configured for Native Client access, the Web Access Clients enable users to log in and access only those resources made available to them via user permissions.

The same Record View Sets used in the Native Clients are available using the Web Clients. This makes it easy to configure what you want your Web users to see, without having to resort to programming. In this image, the asset records are colored by their assigned labels and an asset preview is shown in the bottom pane. A drop-down menu shows the available Record View Sets.

One Interface, Two Audiences

Two versions of the Web Access Clients enable you to choose the level of access you need:

Customer Access (read only)

This version of the Web Access Clients permits remote users to read metadata and preview and download files. They cannot edit metadata or upload new files. This client requires no additional user licenses, which means file collections can be made available to any number of users. This is the version to use if you need to publish certain files to the Web and requires no control over who accesses the files. (As is the case with a standard website.) Of course, you can determine exactly which files are published and you can restrict access to files at any time.

Employee Access (read only & read/write)

This Web Access Client offers users full access to catalogs, including editing metadata and cataloging new files. Each user who connects using this version of the client uses one of the Cumulus Server's licenses. (This version can also deliver license-free "access-only" use at the same time.) This is the version to use when you need to extend full catalog access to employees, while still retaining the option to publish files online to Web visitors.

Both Web Access Clients enable administrators to determine which files are made available to Web users, and a full four levels of diverse security technologies ensure that original files are never accessible from the Internet. (Digital copies are delivered to Web users.)

Web users have access to the very same Asset Actions available with the Native Clients. So, Cumulus can downsample your raster images, change their color space or file format, or even embed watermarks (watermarking requires 3rd party add-on). You can even force Asset Action conversions when you don't want your original, full-resolution files delivered. The Asset Action shown in this image will downsample the selected assets to 72DPI (Web resolution) and convert them to JPEG format. You can configure Asset Actions any way you want, and use as many as you need.

Advanced "Web 2.0" Technologies

Using the most modern Web technologies available, the Web Access Clients offer many of the same advanced user interface features the Cumulus Native Clients offer to Mac OS X and Windows, including:

• "Split views" to enable users to find files based on their relationships with other files.
• Drag & drop for category assignments and asset record sorting.
• Access to shared Category View Sets and Record View Sets to enable administrators to easily configure collection windows layouts.
• Asset check-out/in (with the full access client).
• Access to shared print templates to enable Web visitors to print record collections in predefined formats.
• Metadata assignments using metadata templates and direct record editing (with the full access client).
• Access to shared search queries to enable users to execute complex queries with drop-down menu ease.
• Access to shared Asset Actions, making it possible to preprocess the files downloaded by certain users (color conversion, downsampling, Zip archiving, etc.)

In addition, a Collection Basket enables Web users to gather the files they want in a single place for easy download. Users can easily copy a Web-direct URL to assets that can be emailed to others, and users can choose certain assets to "watch," after which Cumulus will automatically email them when the asset record has been modified.

Asset check-in/out is also available through Canto's Web Clients. Web users can check out the files they need, edit them, check them back in again, and even see a history of all revisions, right from the Web.

Live previews of file formats such as Flash, PDF and QuickTime are available. Each format is handled directly by its respective browser plugin, offering all the functionality you expect.

The same Record View Sets defined and used in the Native Clients are also available using the Cumulus Web Clients.

JSP Tag Library for Easy Configuration

Advanced Web developers can take advantage of the included JSP Tag Libraries, which enable advanced configuration changes to the Web Client interfaces without programming. The JSP Tag Libraries "wrap" several complex Java calls into easy-to-use HTML-like code that can be inserted into your template files and updated as needed.