Release notes

Seats count devices, and one portal can run on several servers

The largest release since 1.0. A Relay Seat now counts a device rather than a person, several servers can serve one portal behind a load balancer, one licence can cover several installations, an address can be opened to the public without a sign-in, and people can reset their own passwords.

Licensing and seats

Signing in to the portal costs nothing at all — the seat is taken by the first launch and returned when the last session on that device ends. A device is a browser profile on a machine, recognised by a cookie. Nothing is fingerprinted.

The consequences, stated plainly:

• Two browsers on one machine, used at the same time, are two seats. Close one and open the other and it is one seat throughout.
• A desk PC and a laptop in use at once are two seats.
• Clearing cookies does not cost a seat.
• One person moving between three machines during the day holds one seat at a time, as long as they sign out or their sessions end.

The unit changed because credentials are shareable. Five accounts used by a hundred people read as five people, and a hundred people were served for the price of five. Two people at two screens are two devices whatever account they type.

A page that shows you the evidence

System → Seats gives one row per device, with the accounts that used it, live sessions, first seen and last active, address, tenant, and — in a pool — the server it is on. It carries the highest number of devices in the last thirty days, which is the figure to hold a renewal conversation on, a CSV export, and a Release control that ends a device's sessions and returns its seat. Two flags mark a likely second browser and a device seen from several addresses at once; both are reports, and neither changes the count.

One licence across several installations

Any activated installation can share its seats with others, so sites that cannot share a database — or cannot reach the internet — still draw on one pool. The installation holding the key issues a single-use enrolment token, lasting 24 hours, and lists every installation using it with its seat usage and a Revoke control. An enrolled installation keeps working on its own if the key holder cannot be reached, up to an allowance based on what it has actually been using. Open sessions are never cut.

Grace, and a notice you cannot miss

Grace now covers expiry as well as an unreachable key holder: applications keep launching after a licence expires until grace ends, with the date shown. A licence notice appears above every console page from ten days before expiry, turning red for the last three days and while an installation is running on grace. It cannot be dismissed, and it clears the moment the licence is renewed.

Licences now also carry an Extra percentage, allowing a short burst above the licensed number rather than a refusal. Seventy seats at five per cent is seventy-three, and the console says so in those words.

Running more than one server

DartRelay now supports a pool: several servers sharing one database, behind a load balancer, on a hostname of their own. Each extra server is added during installation and needs no licence key of its own. A pool gives you capacity and maintenance headroom — you can drain one server, patch it, and put it back without a maintenance window.

System → Load balancer is a new page holding the settings once for every server: trusted proxies, forwarded-header handling, the public address used in email, sign-in by header for appliances that authenticate in front of DartRelay, and the sign-out address. A value set in a server's own configuration file still overrides the console for that server, and the page shows it as locked.

Getting in

An address can admit visitors without a sign-in

Nominate one guest account for the installation, then turn it on either installation-wide or for a single address. A bound address decides this on its own, so turning the installation switch on can never open a customer's branded address. Pair it with an automatic-launch rule and a public address becomes one application and nothing else.

People can reset their own password

A Forgot your password? link on the sign-in page emails a one-time link, for portal accounts and Active Directory accounts alike. It needs two switches — one on the theme, one on the Security page — so that branding permission alone cannot open it. The page gives the same answer whatever is typed, so it cannot be used to discover which usernames exist, and the link always goes to the address already held for the account.

Sessions and hosts

• A separate Windows session for each device, as a per-host option. One person in two browsers gets two Windows sessions instead of sharing one.
• Sign out of Windows when the last tab closes, as a per-host option. Stops abandoned disconnected sessions being offered to the next arrival. Published applications only.
• Applications follow the window. Going full screen, or leaving it, now resizes the application to fit instead of leaving it at its old size.

The portal

• A single-application portal. An address can be reduced to one application with no catalogue behind it: the Home tab hidden, the application opening by itself, and a Start again panel when the person closes it.
• Automatic launch is chosen per address. Open an address under Tenancy & Branding and add rules to it in the order you want them. The rule still decides what opens and who it applies to; the address decides where.
• File transfer settings moved. One card holds the path, the account and what people may do in the drive, and any individual desktop or application can override all of it.