Centrally manage all your clients in new 3-in-1 Clients page & Applications control

Nebula_Yvonne

The client page is a way for Nebula administrators to manage and monitor all clients in a network. They can easily understand the status of each client at a glance. In Nebula Phase 11, the 3-in-1 clients page is introduced. It combines all clients from the gateway, the switches, and the access points into one page on the site-level for offering a more efficient way for client management.

Furthermore, Applications is a feature that needs a NSS/UTM license. The feature allows the administrators to block/unblock the network services and even set speed limits on some services. By utilizing the Applications feature, the admins can have a close monitoring and control on all clients’ network usage in the network.

This article portrays two handy features: a.) 3-in-1 Clients page b.) Applications Control. The former feature offers great functionality for client management and the latter one gives users a way to supervise and control application usage. Using these two features together can have the completed control on all clients in the whole network, as these functions have the ability to set limit on either a client or a service.

• 3-in-1 Clients page

In this site-wide clients page, we can see all devices under AP/SW/GW, as shown below.

Figure 1: Side-wide clients page

Prior to NCC phase 11 release, we were only be able to check the clients page by each product line (AP/SW/GW). Luckily, the new 3-in-1 clients page came out in phase 11, this page is capable to show all clients in one single page as well as switching to each individual AP, SW, or GW clients page.

Figure 2: Drop down list of Clients page

By choosing one of the client pages, we are able to monitor clients with a different time range.  NCC Pro Pack license is needed for the Last 7 and Last 30 days data.

Figure 3: Drop down list of time range

• Applications Control

      > Category View
      > Application View
         

We are going to introduce the Application feature in this section.

Here, we have the Category View of Applications as the screenshot shows below:

We can see that all applications are recorded by category on the chart on the left-hand side of the screen, and the total usage shows on the diagram with timestamps on the right-hand site of the screen.

Figure 4: Category View – Last 24 hours

The chart and the diagram are remapped when changing the time range.

Figure 5: Category View – Last 7 days

The way to change from Category View to Application View is to click the button on the upper right corner.

Figure 6: Change View

We can also check the usage of each service on this list in the bottom image.

The most critical thing you must know on the applications list is that when your mouse hovering to one of the services, you can see there is a “Block” and “Limit” action buttons on the right side. Click “Block” and then save button to enforce your network to BLOCK the service you would not like your user to access or use; in the same fashion, click “Limit” and then save button to LIMIT the downloading and uploading speed of a specific service from your clients.

Note: Speed limit is only available on USG FLEX

Figure 7: The service list in the Application View with Block & Limit buttons

All blocked applications will be listed in the “Show policy applications” tab.

Figure 8: Show policy applications

An additional page will pop out when clicking the “Limit” button. The admin can configure the throughput of a service per interface here.

Figure 9: Speed limit for a service

Once we configure the speed limit, for example Google in this case, we can see which interface is being limited.

Figure 10: Speed limit interface

We can BLOCK services, and we can also UNBLOCK services. Just need to move the mouse hovering on the service that was blocked to unblock.

Figure 11: Unblock service

By selecting one of the applications to see who is using this service.

Figure 12: Client in application detail page / Yahoo

On the other hand, the admin is also able to block services for the whole network on the single Category View page.

Figure 13: Service list of Category View

Click one of the categories to see what services are included in the chosen category.

Figure 14: Service list of social networks

Here is the list showing what services are supported for speed limit.