PMComplete™ Architecture
Technologies Used in the PMComplete Pty Ltd Web Site, PMComplete™ and PMMentor™
The minimum client workstation platform required to run PMComplete™ is:
- Personal Computer OR Apple® Macintosh®
- 64 MB RAM
- Mouse
- Keyboard
- Display size may be set to any of the standard screen settings. It will be detected automatically and screen displays are adjusted accordingly.
- Disk space requirements are limited to web browser and Adobe® Flash® Player (approximately 150KB) requirements only
- All types of printers are supported through the Microsoft® Windows® and the web browser interfaces
- All reports are designed to be printed on A4/Letter/Quarto sized paper
- Most reports print in portrait mode. Those reports which print in landscape mode are indicated as such by a landscape icon found in the heading of the report
- Microsoft® Internet Explorer (IE) v8.0.6001.18882, v9.0.8112.16421IC (9.0.3) OR Internet Explorer Mobile (IE) v4.01 OR Netscape Communicator v7.1, v7.2 OR Mozilla Firefox™ 3.6.2, 3.6.8, 3.6.11, 3.6.16, 4.0, 5.0, 6.0.1, 7.1, 8.0.1, 10.0 OR Apple® Safari™ 4.0.4 (531.21.10), 5.0.2 (7533.18.5), 5.0.5 (7533.21.1), 5.1.1 (7534.51.22), 5.1.2 (7534.52.7) OR Google Chrome 10.0.648.127, 12.0.742.112, 15.0.874.121m, 16.0.912.77m OR Google Android 3.2.1 web browser software OR BlackBerry 9000 web browser 4.6.0.126. Note that Microsoft® Internet Explorer 5.0 is NOT recommended, because it can timeout at the client workstation end during long jobs. Usage of Microsoft® Internet Explorer 4.0 is theoretically possible, although has never been tested
- Adobe® Flash® Player v8.0, v9.0.16.0 web browser add-in (this automatically loads the first time a chart is displayed if you do not already have it installed) (versions earlier than 8.0 are no longer supported by PMComplete™)
- Modem OR equivalent
- Telecommunications link to the Internet
- E-Mail connection if wanting to e-mail reports from within PMComplete™ or wanting to use the Alert, Escalation, Notification, Reminder and/or WorkFlow features
- NetCaptor is NOT recommended, because it looses monitoring of pop-ups
- For Microsoft® Internet Explorer, you need to ensure that Tools » Internet Options » Security Tab » Custom Level » Run ActiveX controls and plug-ins » "Enabled". This is the normal setting. The only ActiveX control used is Adobe® Flash® Player
- The following fonts are required on the client workstation:
- Arial (fallback: Helvetica)
- Courier New
- Monotype Corsiva
- Tahoma
- Times New Roman
- Verdana (fallback: sans-serif)
- All of these fonts are standard Microsoft® Windows® fonts
- All of these fonts are shipped with PMComplete™ for the extremely rare situation that these were not installed when the client workstation had Microsoft® Windows® installed
- All pages render using charset=utf-8
- There are some minor differences between how Microsoft® Internet Explorer, Netscape Communicator and Mozilla Firefox™ operate when accessing PMComplete™. Netscape Communicator, Mozilla Firefox™, Google Chrome and Apple® Safari™ will not:
- Play mouseover clickable object "click" sounds (these can be turned off by a System User-controlled option)
- Display mouseover clickable object "flip" images
- Mozilla Firefox™ is far better at printing hard copy than Microsoft® Internet Explorer
- PMComplete™ provides explicit fromatting support for tablet computers (eg, iPad and Android). Specifically:
- Icons are bigger (to support selecting items with fingers rather than a mouse)
- Spacing between records on lists is increased (to support selecting records with fingers rather than a mouse)
- Icons are not pre-cached (to minimise telecommunications line bandwidth and speed up login time)
- Static toolbar menus are replaced with a menu button (to minimise telecommunications line bandwidth and speed up login time)
- There are no hover tips (because there is no mouse to do the hovering)
- Charts are not displayed on iPads (because it does not support Adobe® Flash®)
- PMComplete™ takes a progressive enhancement approach to the support and implementation of new and emerging web technologies (eg, rounded corners, shadows and gradients)
There are some minor differences between how Microsoft® Internet Explorer and Microsoft® Internet Explorer Mobile (AKA "Windows® CE") operate when accessing PMComplete™. These are designed to improve the usage experience on a small screen and are:
| Feature | IE | IE Mobile |
| Web Site | Full | Does not display graphics or PMComplete silver bar at top |
| Web Site In-Page Hot Link References | Work correctly | Work correctly |
| Web Site PMComplete™ Demonstration, Newsletter and PMMentor™ Registrations | Work correctly | Work correctly |
| Record Selection from List | Click anywhere on desired record | Click on special (red) Record Selector button |
| Language Setting (see below) | Dynamic | Fixed (USA) |
| Foreign Key Record Selection | Ajax Autocomplete | Drop-Down List |
| Menu Type | As defined in "Options and Preferences" | Dynamically overrides "Options and Preferences" at sign in time and is set to "2-Frames" |
| Number of Fields Displayed Across Maintenance Screens | As defined in "Options and Preferences" | Dynamically overrides "Options and Preferences" at sign in time and is set to "1-Up" |
| Error Message Sound | Played correctly | Played correctly |
| Click on Checkbox Label | Works correctly | Works correctly |
| Maintenance Screen Buttons | Work correctly | Work correctly |
| Maintenance Screen Special Operations Links | Work correctly | Work correctly |
| Maintenance Screen Buttons | Work correctly | Work correctly |
| Maintenance Screen Tabs | Work correctly | Work correctly (but take a noticeable time to do so) |
| Maintenance Screen Foreign Key Pop-Up Displays and Record Selections | Work correctly | Work correctly |
| Chart Display | Work correctly | Does not display (since required Adobe® Flash® add-in is not supported by the web browser) |
| Mouse-Over Effects | Icon rollover, playing of clicks and title pop-up tips work correctly | Since there is no mouse and no "hover" capability, none of these effects work |
| Dynamic Screen Toolbar Buttons (eg, All, None, Go, etc) | Work correctly | Work correctly |
| Web browser's Back Button | Works correctly | Works correctly |
| Fieldsets and Legends | Work correctly | Not displayed |
| RoadMaps | Work correctly | Work correctly but are hard to read |
| Help Displays | Work correctly | Work correctly |
| PMMentor™ | Works correctly | Works correctly |
Mobile phones do not:
- Display animations
Tablets do not:
- Display animations
PMComplete™ uses the web browser's Language setting to dynamically tailor:
- Spelling (eg, Organisation versus Organization)
- Venacular (eg, Postal Code versus Zip Code and Mobile versus Cell (phone))
- Date format (eg, DD/MM/YYYY versus MM/DD/YYYY)
- Paper size (eg, A4 versus Letter/Quarto)
- Currency symbol (eg, $, £, etc)
This setting is only detected at sign in time. If you choose to change it, you should sign out, close your web browser and then re-start.
The minimum server platform required to run PMComplete™ is:
- Personal Computer server
- 512MB RAM (preferred 4GB on data base server and 4GB on Internet Information Services server) 1GB RAM is better, 4GB RAM is best
- 1 GB disk (300MB for initial data base with no data, 700MB for data base expansion, 40MB for application code and 10MB for miscellaneous software (.DLLs, etc))
- CD-ROM (for distributing software)
- Microsoft® Windows® NT (v5.0) or Microsoft® Windows® 2000 (Professional and Server) or Microsoft® Windows® XP (Professional) or Microsoft® Windows® 2003 (Server)
- Microsoft® Internet Information Services (IIS)(v5.0, v5.1 or v6.0)
- Microsoft® SQL Server™ (MSSQL) (v2008 R2) (NOT SUPPLIED)
- Microsoft® Data Access Control (MDAC) 2.8 SP1
- PMComplete™ will use 2 data bases sometimes. You should ensure that your Microsoft® SQL Server™ and/or ASP host CAL licences allow for this
- Persits Software ASPEmail (v4.5) (SUPPLIED WITH PMComplete™)
- InfoSoft Global FusionCharts (v3.1.1) (SUPPLIED WITH PMComplete™)
- Microsoft® XML Core Services (v1.0) (SUPPLIED WITH PMComplete™)
- The PMComplete™ data base can be on the same or different server to the application
- The module UploadclsUpload.asp is used to perform file uploads from client workstations to servers. This module does NOT need to be registered on all servers that PMComplete™ may run on (since it is installed as an .asp module)
- The .DLL ASPMail.DLL is used to provide an SMTP e-mail interface on the server. This .DLL needs to be registered on all servers that PMComplete™ may run on
- The .DLL MSXML.DLL is used to perform XML parsing on the server. This .DLL needs to be registered on all servers that PMComplete™ may run on. This .DLL is supplied with every copy of Microsoft® Internet Explorer and is normally found in the \Windows\System32 folder and is normally already registered
For our technical friends, the following technologies have been used to develop PMComplete™ and this World Wide Web site:
- Microsoft® Active Server Pages (ASP) (v3.0)
- Microsoft® Visual Basic Scripting Edition (VBScript) (v5.0)
- Microsoft® Personal Web Server (PWS) (v98)
- Microsoft® Personal Web Manager (PWM) (v2000)(svc2)
- Microsoft® ActiveX Data Objects (ADO) (v2.5)
- Microsoft® OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers (ODBC32.DLL)(v3.520.7430.0)
- Microsoft® Collaboration Data Objects (CDO.DLL) (v1.21)
- Mail Application Program Interface (MAPI) (32-bit)
- Microsoft® Visual Basic (VB) (v6.0)
- Java Scripting Language (JavaScript)
- Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML5)
- Extended Hyper Text Markup Language (XHTML) (v1.0)
- Cascading Style Sheets (CSS3)
- Microsoft® Dynamic Hyper Text Markup Language (DHTML)
- eXtensible Markup Langauage (XML) (v1.0)
- Data Storage Name (DSN)
- UltraEdit-32 (v7.10a)
- Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) Text type
- Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) Audio type
- Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) Doc type
- Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) PPT type
- Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) XLS type
- Microsoft® Windows® Help (v98)
- Microsoft® HTML Help Authoring Workshop (v4.73.8302.0)
- Microsoft® Help Compiler (v3.10.505)
- Structured Query Language (SQL)
- Microsoft® Word (v6.0 and v2007)
- Funnel Web Profiler (v1.0)
- Microsoft® Paint (v6.0 Build 6001 SP1)
- GlobalSCAPE CuteFTP (5.0.3 XP Build 53.1.7.1)
- Corel® Paint Shop Pro® (v7.04)
- GLTC Technology used throughout
- DeepMetrix LiveStats XSP (v6.2)
- Microsoft® Windows® 2000 (Professional)
- Microsoft® Windows® XP (Professional SP1)
- Microsoft® Windows® Vista (Ultimate SP1)
- MindJet MindManager Smart (v2.1.3)
- Asynchronous JavaScript And XML (AJAX)
- Prototype Framework (v1.4.0)
- script.aculo.us (v1.6.4)
- Rico (v1.1.2)
- ClustrMaps
- Microsoft® Visio® 2003 SP3
- Dojo (Release 1.6.1)
- Deluxe Menu (version 3.15)
- MYOB® (Premier for Windows® Australia Release Version 12.5.0F)
- EJS TreeGrid v7.0
- vCard version 3.0
- vCalendar version 2.0
The following technical issues may be of interest:
- PMComplete™ doesn't use cookies
- There are no .DLL's downloaded to client workstations
- Nothing needs to be pre-installed on the client workstation except for the web browser software
- No Microsoft® Windows® system components are modified on the client workstation
- PMComplete™ is as "Thin Client" as you can get. It is sometimes referred to as "Zero Client"
- PMComplete™ doesn't use the Session object to remember session or application state
- A data base is used for session and application state persistence
- There are no restrictions in running PMComplete™ from a server farm
- Frames are used for defining separate screen scrolling regions
- The PMComplete™ data base consists of over 440 tables
- You can set up PMComplete™ to run using SSL/Certificates. This may be using your own signed certificate or one provided by an external Certificate Authority (CA)
The following performance information may be of interest:
- The web page with the largest amount of data that is down loaded is the Options and Preferences page
- The Options and Preferences page is approximately 100KB
- The largest image or sound file downloaded during normal operation is 3KB
- The largest image file downloaded during tutorials and RoadMaps is 76 KB
- The normal response time that you can expect is less than 3 seconds
- PMComplete™ is a low transaction volume application. Network bandwidth usage requirements are low. System CPU will be high when processing transactions. Disk I/O is generally low
- Peak transaction processing time on the server is normally Monday mornings when staff are entering their timesheets for the previous week
- If you configure "Rich Client" functionality, then maintenance screens will be slower (and will be FAR slower in older web browsers (eg, earlier than Microsoft® Internet Explorer (IE) 8.00 and Mozilla Firefox™ 3.1)
The following are areas where Rich Client (AKA "Rich Internet Application (RIA)") functionality is deployed:
- Autocomplete fields
- TextArea fields
- Date fields
- "None and All" check box field selection buttons
- Project's Financial Spreadsheet's fixing of headers and left columns from scrolling
- Telephone number lookup
- Menus
- Personal Calendar Dynamic dashboard Agent
- "Make Same" button on Add a Business Card
The following information is about external hosting (Application Service Provider) support:
- PMComplete™ can be hosted on behalf of other organisations (eg, by ASPs providing Software as a Service (SaaS))
- Explicit support is provided for ASPs and SaaS
- Bulk provisioning allows for mass take-up of new System Users
- Multiple instances of the application on the one server
- Multiple instances of the data base on the one server
- Security control over system administration functionality
- No automatic linking to a "higher" web page
- No automatic resolution of e-mail addresses from Microsoft® Exchange Server
- Smaller sound files used on error messages
- Support for a generic e-mail SMTP service interface
- No checking of PMComplete™ licence expiry date
- No checking for exceeding of maximum number of active System Users
PMComplete™ is hosted for PMComplete Pty Ltd by:
Mort Bay Communications Pty Ltd
E-Mail: sales@mbcomms.net.au
Site: www.mbcomms.net.au
Telephone: (+61) (2) 9559 2629
Facsimile: (+61) (2) 9559 4955
Snail Mail: PO Box H159
Hurlstone Park
NSW 2193 Australia
Deliver More. Manage Less.