What's New in CTERA Portal Version 8.1.x

CTERA Portal version 8.1.x includes a number of new features for global and team portal administrators and for end users.

Note

In addition to the new features described in this article, the features described in What's New in CTERA Portal Version 8.0.x are also incorporated in this version.

Global Administration

Administrator Role for WORM Compliance: CTERA Vault

WORM (write once, read many) compliance ensures that data cannot be tampered with or deleted.

CTERA provides a role, Compliance Officer, and a permission, Manage Compliance Settings, that you use to manage compliance. You can also set the Manage Compliance Settings permission for a Read/Write Administrator.

Only administrators with the Manage Compliance Settings can set up the CTERA Vault on a folder.

Setting Up Access to Portal Content Using the S3 API: CTERA Fusion

Portal content can be accessed using the S3 API either using supported S3 operations in programs or using an S3 browser application like FileZilla, WinSCP, Cyberduck, CloudBerry, and S3 Browser.

A portal server must be designated as an S3 endpoint.

Checking the S3 Endpoint is required on only one server. For high availability, you can set the S3 Endpoint on more than one server

Storage Node Changes

The EMC ViPR (S3) storage node is no longer supported.

The Hitachi Vantara HCP (S3) new storage node is available.

Ability to Enable Zones From the User Interface

Zones can be enabled from the Global Settings window, accessed from the Control Panel by clicking SETTINGS > Global Settings.

Team Portal Administration

WORM Compliance: CTERA Vault

WORM (write once, read many) compliance ensures that data cannot be tampered with or deleted. In may industries, and especially regulated industries such as financial services and government sectors, organizations are required to store certain types of data in unalterable formats. CTERA Vault uses WORM technology to prevent editing, overwriting, renaming or erasing this data.

When a cloud drive folder is defined with folder compliance, after an initial, optional, grace period, the contents of the folder can be protected from any attempt to change the folder content such as by renaming, moving, modifying, or deleting content for a specified retention period.

CTERA Edge Filer must be 7.6.3111.5 or higher.

Setting Up Access to Portal Content Using the S3 API: CTERA Fusion

CTERA Fusion enables the content of cloud folders to be accessed using the S3 API, either using supported S3 operations in programs or using an S3 browser application like FileZilla, WinSCP, Cyberduck, CloudBerry, and S3 Browser.

The capabilities of CTERA Fusion include:
In-Place Read/Write – Enables reading and writing directly to a global file system using the S3 protocol eliminating expensive and time-consuming processes of copying data to external S3 buckets.
Single Namespace Across File and Object – Interact with data generated at the edge using standard object storage S3 protocols, or access cloud-generated data from the edge using NAS protocols. Data is available where you need it, when you need it.
Support for Multipart Uploads and Presigned URLs – Benefit from advanced data transfer capabilities like multipart uploads and pre-signed URLs, making ingestion and sharing of large files even more efficient.
Robust Security – All data is secured in transit via TLS and encrypted at rest, providing an added layer of protection.

A new Folder option, Buckets, is listable by S3 and by CTTP.

End User Portal View

Item Details

When selecting one or more folders or files, you can click in the top menu to display folder or file details.

Single File Details	Single Folder Details	Multiple Item Details

A team administrator with the Manage Compliance Settings permission has an additional tab, Compliance, when selecting one or more folders or files in the end user portal. This tab displays compliance settings for the selected items.

Using an S3 Browser to Access Cloud Drive Folders: CTERA Fusion

Portal content can be accessed using the S3 API. The content is the same content that is available using the WebDAV protocol, for example using CTERA Drive Connect. This enables you to browse and modify the data using applications like FileZilla, WinSCP, Cyberduck, CloudBerry, and S3 Browser.

Ability to Change the Content View

The user can view the portal content as follows:

List
Files are listed with the following details:

• The user who created or last modified the content with the date and time.
• For files: The size of the file in gigabytes, megabytes, or kilobytes.

Details
Files are listed with the following details:

• The user who created or last modified the content with the date and time.
• For files:
  • The file type.
  • The size of the file in both gigabytes, megabytes or kilobytes, and bytes.

Tiles
Files are displayed tiled.

Global Administration

Global administrator features:

• Setting Up the Database Replication Server
• Ability to Display Thumbnails
• Faster Portal Installation
• Removed the Deprecated Data Loss Prevention (DLP) Option
• Security Section Added to Global Settings
• Changes to the Default Virtual Portal Settings
• Administrator Reports

Setting Up the Database Replication Server

The database replication server is now defined in the user interface instead of during the initial configuration of the serve: The Replication window previously displayed during the server setup, to specify replication of the primary server database is no longer displayed:

For details about how to specify the database replication server, see Configuring an Additional Server.

Ability to Display Thumbnails

Thumbnails are reduced-size versions of pictures or videos, used to help in recognizing and organizing them, serving the same role for images as a normal text index does for words.

The Thumbnail service is configured by the global administrator. When the CTERA Portal is configured to display thumbnails, the following file types are displayed as thumbnails: JPEG/JPG, PNG, GIF, BMP, TIFF, WebP, SVG.

For details, see Managing the Thumbnail Service.

Faster Portal Installation

Some of the portal infrastructure takes a long time to initialize. To make the installation process faster the relevant modules are started in background as a separate task. The portal can be used even before these modules are initialized.

For details, see Initializing Server Modules.

Removed the Deprecated Data Loss Prevention (DLP) Option

The option to define DLP has been deprecated for a few versions and the option has now been removed from the user interface.

Security Section Added to Global Settings

The Global Settings includes a Security section which enables embedding the portal in an inline frame (iframe), by checking Allow embedding End User Services Portal.

Changes to the Default Virtual Portal Settings

The following changes have been made to the default virtual portal settings, in the global administrator view:

• Encryption and compression options have been removed from folder group settings:
  Use encryption and Use compression options have been removed from the Default Settings for New Folder Groups section.
• A new section for cloud folders has been added.
  Enable Windows ACLs and Extended Attributes have been added to a new virtual portal setting, the Default Settings for New Cloud Folder section in the Virtual Portal settings.
  For details, see Default Settings for New Cloud Folder.
• A new section for integrating CTERA Portal in Microsoft Teams has been added.
  Allowed Domains has been added to a new virtual portal setting, the Microsoft Teams Integration section.
  For details, see Microsoft Teams Integration.

Administrator Reports

By default, new global administrators are no longer sent monthly administrator reports.

For details, see Adding, Editing, or Deleting Global Administrators.

Team Portal Administration

Team administrator features:

• Support for Files with macOS Tags in New Cloud Folders
• Zones Moved from Folders Menu to Compliance Menu
• Changes to the Team Portal Settings
• Team Administrator Reports
• File Details for WORM Content

Support for Files with macOS Tags in New Cloud Folders

Files defined with macOS tags can be synced to multiple edge filers with their tags.

The macOS extended file attributes are part of the item’s metadata and macOS tags are supported when defining a new cloud folder, by checking Extended Attributes in the New Cloud Drive Folder window in the CTERA Portal:

For details, see Adding or Editing Cloud Folders

Zones Moved from Folders Menu to Compliance Menu

The ability to define Zones has been moved under a new menu option: Compliance in the navigation pane.

Changes to the Team Portal Settings

The following changes have been made to the default virtual portal settings, in the team administrator view:

• Encryption and compression options have been removed from folder goup settings:
  Use encryption and Use compression options have been removed from the Default Settings for New Folder Groups section.
• A new section for cloud folders has been added.
  Enable Windows ACLs and Extended Attributes have been added to a new virtual portal setting, the Default Settings for New Cloud Folder section in the Virtual Portal settings.
  For details, see Default Settings for New Cloud Folder.
• A new section for integrating CTERA Portal in Microsoft Teams has been added.
  Allowed Domains has been added to a new virtual portal setting, the Microsoft Teams Integration section.
  For details, see Microsoft Teams Integration.

Team Administrator Reports

By default, new team administrators are no longer sent monthly administrator reports.

For details, see Managing Administrator Users.

File Details for WORM Content

When the team administrator with the Manage Compliance Settings permission is in the end user portal, the Item Details button, , has an additional tab, WORM, instead of Compliance, when selecting one or more files.

Single File Details	Multiple File Details

End User Portal View

End user features:

• Integrating a Portal in Microsoft Teams
• Improvements to CTERA Fusion
• Ability to View Thumbnails

Integrating a Portal in Microsoft Teams

Access to a CTERA Portal can be added to Microsoft Teams as part of a channel or a group chat inside a team or as a personal tab for an individual user.

For details about setting up a CTERA Portal within Microsoft Teams, see Integrate CTERA Portal in Microsoft Teams.

Improvements to CTERA Fusion

The following improvements are included with CTERA Fusion:

• CTERA Fusion now supports S3 browsers that use multipart uploads.
• NT-ACL settings are supported.
  Note

  Files are listed without Access Based Enumeration.

Ability to View Thumbnails

Thumbnails are reduced-size versions of pictures or videos, used to help in recognizing and organizing them, serving the same role for images as a normal text index does for words.

When the global administrator configures the CTERA Portal to display thumbnails, the following file types are displayed as thumbnails: JPEG/JPG, PNG, GIF, BMP, TIFF, WebP, SVG.

Thumbnails are displayed with the Details or Tiles views and not with the List view.

List View	Details View	Tiles View