Secure WiFi solutions specialist AirTight Networks introduced its next-generation HTML5 user interface, a scalable platform designed to help simplify management of WiFi networks and wireless IPS (WIPS) networks for organizations with limited IT resources.
The AirTight Management Console has been designed to comply with UI standards for Web 3.0 and cloud applications and is usable on a wide variety of Web browsers, operating systems and devices, including Google’s Android platform, Apple iPads and iOS devices and other tablets.
To help simplify user interaction and reduce the time it takes to accomplish a particular task, the entire administration workflow, from managing service set identifier (SSID) profiles and radio properties to defining WIPS policies, creating user accounts and scheduling reports, is streamlined with a hierarchical tile-based organization.
In addition, AirTight’s hierarchical location-based policy definition and administration allows consistent policies to be pushed across all or selected group of locations with one click, and everything from dashboards, devices and alerts to role-based administration and reporting can be viewed in the context of the selected location.
“As this latest announcement from AirTight shows, WLAN management belongs in the cloud,” Craig Mathias, a principal with the wireless and mobile advisory firm Farpoint Group, said in a statement. “Highly distributed operations clearly benefit from a cloud-based management strategy. AirTight is also pointing the way with a highly customizable UI, multi-platform support, HTML5, and the integration of wireless security and access under a single management console.”
Another feature is a configurable dashboard that allows individual users to create a personal workspace and optimize the information display depending on their needs and screen size. Each user can create multiple dashboards, each with a custom layout, and choose from more than 25 widgets to populate the dashboards with the information they need.
The platform also provides network administrators with a selection of widgets that offer users an assortment of statistics and trends on WiFi performance and wireless security at multiple levels, from access points (APs,) to clients, SSIDs and locations, as well as specific and elastic time durations that can range from hours to months.
“IT management involves so many aspects that it is vital for supporting tools to present simple and intuitive user interfaces, yet still offer the details necessary for the management task to be executed effectively,” Rob Bamforth, principal analyst with IT analytics firm Quocirca, said in a statement. “Customization and configurability are key for IT managers to be able to set out what is most important for their day to day needs.”
AirTight WiFi, which was first launched in 2010, is part of the company’s Cloud Services portfolio of products and services, which includes AirTight WIPS. The HTML5 UI is available as part of the AirTight Cloud Services, a company release noted.
“Until now, WLAN administration has required highly skilled IT staff, often needing extensive training and certification by WLAN vendors to use their products,” Kaustubh Phanse, chief evangelist at AirTight, said in a statement. “AirTight wanted to change that and designed a management console that administrators could start using in mere minutes, on their own and get their job done as quickly and simply as possible.”