Building a Remote System for Monitoring Security Equipment

Summary

The remote system for monitoring security equipment provides full control of any security devices that have sensors. The desktop application helps administrators to manage user rights and access permissions, bill customers, and build reports. The Web application features all the functions available in the desktop version plus some additional features designed for customers. For example, it provides such services as monitoring of video cameras, remote connection to sensors monitoring the system, remote management of security system servers, etc.

Additionally, it is possible to associate some documents related to a project.

The application uses a highly secure connection protected by HTTPS, limited session time, IP-based restrictions, as well as by Altoros’s custom and third-party solutions that proxy traffic from restricted network areas. All these procedures help us to provide manageable and fully controllable public access.

The need

The Altoros’s team updated the legacy desktop application, added a number of new features, developed the Web application, designed the user interface, tested the system, and—finally—optimized performance.

The challenges

One of the most interesting tasks in this project was to provide manageable access to the restricted network from the Internet. Since customers purchase different sets of services, it was important to implement access permissions in the Web client.

The solution

We employed Internet Information Services for Windows Server to solve the issue with differentiation of permissions. URL Rewrite was used to set access rights and Application Request Routing enhanced reliability and scalability of the system. As a result, administrators can now manage user permissions and users have access to local resources from the Web client for the time of one session.

The outcome

The system was tested by end users and a list of improvements was composed based on the results. In addition, Altoros’s engineers measured performance, detected existing bottlenecks, and then optimized the system.