Planning for deployment

Host On-Demand provides access to host applications from a Web browser. The browser downloads the Host On-Demand Java applet from the Web server and then connects to any Telnet server to access host applications. The Host On-Demand applet needs configuration information to determine which host to connect to and other host session properties. This configuration information can be provided to the Host On-Demand applet from an HTML file that is used to launch Host On-Demand or by the Host On-Demand configuration server. The configuration server is a part of that centrally stores session configuration information and user preferences by user and group IDs. Users then access session information and user preferences by contacting the configuration server. The configuration server is managed through the administration client. For information on configuring the Host On-Demand configuration server, see Basic Configuration Steps.

As Web browsers start to eliminate support for Java plug-ins, Host On-Demand clients will continue to work with some limitations as documented in IBM Host On-Demand browser support.

You can create custom client HTML files using the Deployment Wizard. When creating these HTML files, you can choose from three different configuration models to specify how session configuration information and user preferences are defined and managed: the HTML-based model, the configuration server-based model, and the combined model.

These models are described below. For detailed information on each model and benefits and limitations to using each model, see Help for Deployment Wizard Configuration Model Panel.