Hybrid Deployment Using Static Files

Deployment Models Overview 

Apty operates in Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and Hybrid deployment models: 

• SaaS: cloud-based SaaS solution model is hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS). AWS-powered implementation requires no infrastructure maintenance and upgrades from the customer. In this case, after Apty content is created via the authoring tool (Apty Studio) it is stored on the server.  

The instructional content can be made accessible to end users via Apty Widget. When the Apty Widget is loaded into the application, it contacts the server via REST API and downloads the list of Workflows, theme settings and other data required for seamless integration. Downloaded data are cached so that the Widget has no need to make multiple requests to the server to repeatedly access the same piece of information. 

• Hybrid Deployment: for the customers who take full responsibility for corporate data privacy and choose to avoid dependency outside servers, Apty supports a self-hosting option, where the entire deployment is performed on the local resources of the customer side. Application files can be located on any server supporting SSL (nginx, Apache, etc.) on the Windows / Linux / MacOS environment. 

The following document provides an overview of the hybrid deployment via static files. 

How hybrid deployment using static files works 

With the hybrid deployment via static file, the content is created via Apty Studio and is stored on a web server, but the key difference is in the way the content is delivered to the end user. 

Created Apty content is stored on the Apty server and can be manually downloaded as JavaScript or JSON bundles. These files can be added to the hosting application by uploading them to the Customer’s HTTP server in their private network; from there they can be injected to the surface of the hosting application. This approach guarantees full control over the security processes and is a perfect solution if no HTTP requests should be sent outside of the Customer’s network. 

Solution Peculiarities 

No analytical data is collected by Apty. Metadata collected by Apty serves as a research material for building analytical reports for providing admins with helpful insights on application's usage patterns, task completion rate, and common mistakes made by the end users. Since all the content is stored on the Customer’s server and Apty’s event listeners have no access to user actions, such as clicks, returning to the previous step, flow errors, etc., no analytical data as well as analytical reports are available for this application. 

Completion states are not accessible for Apty. In the SaaS approach Apty collects data on the completion states of Workflows, to define whether the user has already went through them. This information is helpful for creating onboardings and prompting users to complete collection of tasks while tracking their progress. This data is normally passed to the Apty server, but in the hybrid approach it is stored in the browser cache. In case an end user opens a hosting application from a new browser, the progress data is going to be lost. 

Changes to the content must be handled manually. Since there is no direct communication with Apty server, when the content is updated, corresponding JSON or JavaScript bundles should be downloaded and updated in the private network. 

Solution’s Advantage 

This approach provides a completely self-hosted solution, giving Customers full control over their private network and data.