MuseKnowledge™ Proxy 5.0 Build 04 is Available

A new version of Muse™ Proxy was released on 21 June 2018. Muse™ Proxy version 5.0 is now available for download, trial and purchase/upgrade. The highlights of the new version are presented below.

Starting with this version, Muse™ Proxy supports relaying and filtering the WebSocket Protocol. According to the RFC 6455 the theoretic definition is: “The WebSocket Protocol enables two-way communication between a client running untrusted code in a controlled environment to a remote host that has opted-in to communications from that code”. To control WebSocket filtering and frame serialization mode the WEBSOCKET configuration element was introduced in the source profile.

A new proxy application template, MKPF, with a new look and feel is available. MuseProxyFoundation, the old one is still maintained and available with all the features up to date. On a fresh install Anonymous, MuseProxyFoundation and MKPF will all be installed and available, while on an update MKPF will be installed but not linked to in the Applications.xml file to avoid compatibility issues.

The Administrator Console is now based on a new theme and a new component is available to help the administrator of Muse™ Proxy to manage and maintain the applications and their sources.
This section can be accessed from the Applications menu via the Manage Applications link as long as SERVLET_ENGINE_ENABLED is set on true. There are visual actions for the common elements and raw view/update actions, where directly the XML files behind are edited in a simple JavaScript editor ensuring XML well-formedness. An application can be edited, copied, exported, imported, backed up, restored, checked or deleted. A source can have its profile edited, backed up and restored, while the other attributes from the Sources.xml file related to a source, such as image, visibility, module, attributes and parameters can be also managed. Source grouping including defining new visual areas and categories is also possible. Authentication to an application can be managed, details for the login module set and their configuration files can be edited in a raw XML form. The Manage Applications tools work with the last MKPF and old-style MuseProxyFoundation provided with the current setup, while for the existent applications not all the functions will be active.

A Muse™ Proxy source can be integrated with OLSA API to create the user dynamically and perform the signon. This is based on SOAP requests which are made transparently when the configured source with this integration is accessed by a Muse™ Proxy user. If all the configurations related to the organization are done, with this new feature a user of Muse™ Proxy application can jump into the Skillsoft Skillport 8i platform as an authenticated user of this platform without the need for continuous content proxy rewriting.

The integration within a Learning Management System (LMS) was extended and starting with this version, a Muse™ Proxy application can be integrated as Rich Content Editor in a Canvas LMS. Note that only the latest MuseProxyFoundation and MKPF applications can be integrated.

Starting with this version the ProxyLoginModuleLDAP can be configured with a script to take final decisions based on attributes and membership of user which log in. Also in this module, the referral configuration for LDAP authentication is possible via the new REFERRAL element with either ignore, follow or stop values. Two new attributes have been added, startTls="false/true" and sslTrustAll="false/true", ensuring a wider integration of Muse™ Proxy with LDAP servers. More details can be found in the comments from ProxyLoginModuleLDAP.xml and in the manuals.

In addition to the ECMA script processing via the Oracle Nashorn engine, the reference process in a source profile can now be done via BeanShell scripting engine.

A new CLASSPATH structure to create ClassLoaders was added in the MuseProxy.xml configuration file in order to reliably support third party libraries for various platform integrations in Muse™ Proxy.

A new pattern option, named excludeLocal, was added in order to exclude from main source(Link Out) but rewrite with others if matching. This option can be used within include and exclude pattern options from REWRITTING_PATTERNS configuration entry from the source profile.

A new element EXPIRY_ERROR inside the Applications.xml file was added in order to specify a response status for an expired application and if the specific error message will be displayed or not based on flag value of this configuration.

A new attribute method was added for URL configuration entry from the source profile to specify which HTTP method to be used for the request done – each URL part of an extract and navigate scenario can have its own method attribute (if empty GET or POST is assumed).

The HEADER element is a new configuration item in the source profile aiming to set HTTP headers for each preliminary request.

An option to refresh java policy files was added in Administrator Console and can be found under Advanced menu – Operations page. Java Policy Files which will be refreshed by this action are ${MUSE_HOME}/java.policy and ${MUSE_HOME}/jaas.policy.

In the Administrator Console was added support to refresh SAML and SSO configurations without restarting the entire Servlet Engine.

For source profiling a new boolean flag, DYN_HOST_MAPPING is available. It indicates that host mapping to a shorter generated value will be used on the fly if the https version of the host label exceeds 63 characters.

The detailed list of changes is available in Muse™ Proxy Release Notes PDF Document and the new features are described in the manuals that are part of the distribution. As usual, we offer a Free 30 Day Trial period to fully evaluate the new version of Muse™ Proxy. You can request a Trial License Key by simply filling in the trial form.