Cloud
SoftwareCentral is now available as a service. This means that you no longer need to host and maintain your own SoftwareCentral web site.
It works by installing a CloudConnector on your SCCM server, or any other Windows machine on your network. The CloudConnector works as a bridge between your SCCM and the SoftwareCentral Cloud.
The SoftwareCentral Cloud is secure and reliable and will make your daily life easier, as you no longer need to manually update SoftwareCentral or ensure that your SoftwareCentral is compatible with your version of the Microsoft SCCM.
Security has been our primary concern when developing the SoftwareCentral Cloud.
By setting up your firewall to only allow communication between the SoftwareCentral Cloud and your CloudConnector, and by encrypting all data transferred, the solution is as secure as possible.
Access to the SoftwareCentral Cloud is managed by AD-Group memberships in your own Active Directory.
SoftwareCentral stores no data about users and their personal information in the cloud, including passwords. Authentication is done against your own Active Directory with your own domain accounts.
SoftwareCentral only stores meta data for the shop, license module and deployment manager. This is the same data stored by your current offline SoftwareCentral installation.
The log in SoftwareCentral stores information about transactions, including package names, device names and user names. This data is not categorized and cannot be connected to actual persons by SoftwareCentral.
Users activity in the SoftwareCentral Cloud is logged for usage statistics and to help us improve the product, but cannot be linked to individual persons.
IP-addresses is logged to help prevent malicious users from accessing the system. IP-addresses cannot be linked to physical persons.
All data are stored and protected according to the EU General Data Protection Regulation.
The SoftwareCentral Cloud is hosted in Microsoft Azure on a scalable server farm so there is no single point of failure and no bottlenecks. Databases and servers are backed up daily. SoftwareCentral only stores meta data, the work you have done on your software and device are stored in your local SCCM.
The SoftwareCentral Cloud will be much faster than normal offline installations of SoftwareCentral, as it is hosted on much bigger and faster servers than typically required. During peek hours, more servers will be available, as required.
Of cause your own SCCM still plays a role, but it will be a lot smaller role than usual because of more intensive caching.
Always ensure compatibility with the latest build of the Microsoft SCCM
o When Microsoft releases new versions of the SCCM it sometimes requires updates to SoftwareCentral.
o Running with an old version of SoftwareCentral against a new SCCM can cause downtime
Save time on updating SoftwareCentral
o Get access to new features in SoftwareCentral as soon as they become available
o No need to wait months for a release
o No need to plan for an update
o No need to take backups of database and server before an update
o Feature requests and bug fixes will be delivered much faster
Save a server or two
o Less servers to run and maintain
o No need to worry about backups
o No need to worry about server redundancy
No need to worry about performance on a local server
o The cloud is hosted on a scalable server farm with as many resources as needed
Access to SoftwareCentral from outside your local network
o You can now do anything you could before, from anywhere
Access to SoftwareCentral from mobile devices
o You can now access SoftwareCentral from smartphones and tables
Integration with other cloud services
o It is possible to integrate the SoftwareCentral Cloud API with other cloud services such as ServiceNow
With our new migration tool, you can move your existing SoftwareCentral installation to our cloud in a few minutes.
You can also run the SoftwareCentral Cloud parallel to your current SoftwareCentral installation.
Note that data cannot be replicated between two SoftwareCentral installations. If you migrate data from one installation (a) to another installation (b), all data is lost on the other installation (b).
If you decide that the cloud is not for you, you can use the migration tool to move your SoftwareCentral Cloud back on premises in a matter of minutes.
See the Cloud Installation guide.