Configuring a remote session relies on the resources and requirements of a specific site. Ansys Dynamic Reporting provides some core functionality that simplifies the delivery of VNC-based rendering solutions. These features include:
An integrated VNC client run in a web-browser. This allows for a true zero-footprint install solution that only relies on Ansys Dynamic Reporting and VNC server technologies installed on the remote systems. Ansys Dynamic Reporting generates a web page with an embedded URL containing a private cookie.
Note: Care should be taken to ensure that the transmission of the web page be protected by encryption. For the system to be secure, it is strongly recommended that SSL be used to access the NGINX server for all browser connections. The ADR server honors this encryption.
Resource tracking and simple configuration. All users of the remote sessions allocate the sessions using web pages generated by the ADR server. ADR can track session allocations and exert control over the remote rendering resources via a common database.
Proxy authentication and authorization. The remote session system exploits the authentication and authorization system in the ADR server. From that information, it generates a private cookie for the allocated session and serves it up via REST from the WebSocket server when the JavaScript VNC server is realized.
WebSocket interface for data tunneling. The system implements a WebSocket-based transport system that utilizes existing socket system used by the NGINX instance. It also supports SSL for encrypted connections.
There are two types of remote sessions.
Built-in local EnSight and EnVision sessions. These are associated with file data item filename extensions. For example, an uploaded .evsn file will automatically be associated with EnVision. These sessions will run on the same system as the ADR server and require no specialized configuration.
Externally specified configurations. These are specified in the external_services.json file that is placed in the database directory (the same directory as the view_report.nexdb file).
Note: All of the files used in examples here can be found in the Ansys Dynamic Reporting distribution in:
v251/CEI/nexus251/django/utils/remote/config