Cross-Domain Proxlet Installation

The document provides instructions for installing a proxlet and deploying static wrapper files to enable cross-domain communication between external content and Plateau APIs. This involves extracting files to the content server, deploying a WAR file under Tomcat, and configuring the proxlet URL and file paths in the Plateau LMS and content objects.

Uploaded by

Sumit Kumar

Available Formats

Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

0% found this document useful (0 votes)

28 views

Cross-Domain Proxlet Installation

Uploaded by

Sumit Kumar

Available Formats

Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

You are on page 1/ 3

Cross-domain Proxlet Installation Instructions

Plateau contains three client-side APIs which may be used by external content to communicate
data to Plateau: the SCORM API, the Plateau Tracking API and the PEXAM API. When content
uses one of these APIs for communication, the content must be hosted under the same DNS as
the API it is attempting to use. If the content and the API are hosted under separate DNS names,
the browser will prevent them from communicating.

As a work around to this restriction, Plateau version 5.5 introduced a solution to deploy these
APIs on a content server to make them available to the content. This solution has two main parts.

• Static Wrapper files – These are static files that are deployed as content on your content
server. These files are used to load the APIs and make them available to your external
content.
• Proxlet – This is a small application that must be deployed under an application server
running on your content server. The Proxlet serves as a communication relay between
the APIs and the Plateau LMS.

The following diagram outlines the solution:

Proxlet Installation Page 1

Deploying the Static Wrapper Files on Your Content Server
The cross domain files may be found in the elms/support/crossdomain zip file of your Plateau
install CD. In the crossdomain.zip file, there is a content.zip file that will need to be extracted and
deployed to a web-accessible portion of your content server.

Installing the Proxlet to Your Content Server

The proxlet.war file can be found in the elms/support/crossdomain.zip file of your Plateau install
CD. This war file will need to be deployed under an application server which is running on the
same content server where the static wrapper files were deployed. Since the Proxlet is a very
light-weight application, it may be deployed under Tomcat which may be downloaded free-of-
charge from http://tomcat.apache.org. Though the Proxlet may be deployed under other
application servers, the following install instructions assume Tomcat is being used.

1. Download Tomcat 5.x - http://tomcat.apache.org/download-55.cgi

2. Install/extract Tomcat to your content server.
3. You may need to configure the port for Tomcat. The default value is 8080 which may conflict
with other applications on your server. You can change the port in the /conf/server.xml file.

4. The server will need to have a SUN JDK installed and a JAVA_HOME environment variable
defined (JDK 1.4 for v.5.0 and JDK 5.0 for v.5.5). The SUN JDK may be downloaded from
http://java.sun.com/j2se/downloads
5. Place the proxlet.war (from the elms/support/crossdomain.zip file on your install CD) under
the /webapps directory of Tomcat.
6. Start tomcat using the startup.bat file under the /bin directory.
7. Test the proxlet by hitting the following for your content server -
http://myContentServer.com:8080/proxlet/CrossDomainProxlet (you will need to update this
url to point to your content server).

Configuring the Solution in Plateau

Login to Plateau Administrator and go to System
Admin>Configuration>SystemConfiguration>LMS_ADMIN
Edit the following under the CommunicationCrossDomainSupport section of the LMS_ADMIN
configuration.
• Set CommunicationCrossDomainSupport enabled to "true"
• Add the address of the static wrapper files under DefaultContentServerPath. This
should be the path to the folder containing the main_content_wrapper.html file.
• Add the address to proxlet under DefaultProxletPath. You must use the same server
name, IP, or DNS you used under "DefaultContentServerPath"

** Please note these are default values which may be overridden for individual content objects or questions.

Proxlet Installation Page 2

<CommunicationCrossDomainSupport enabled="true">
<ContentWrapper>


<DefaultContentServerPath>http://myContentServer.com/crossdomain/content
</DefaultContentServerPath>
<ContentWrapperPage name="main_content_wrapper.html" />
<ExternalURLQuestionWrapperPage name="main_question_wrapper.html" />
<ContentOpenerPage name="main_content_opener.html" />
</ContentWrapper>


<DefaultProxletPath>http://myContentServer.com:8080/proxlet</DefaultProxletPath>
</CommunicationCrossDomainSupport>

Configuring Content Objects to Use the Solution

Simply create your content object as you normally would. If the launch type is specified as
Browser or SCORM, the Cross Domain tab will be enabled. Edit the Cross Domain tab to apply
the solution.

1. Check the "Enable Communication Cross Domain through Proxy" box.

2. The default values from the LMS_ADMIN configuration should auto-populate to the page.
You may update these values if you wish.
3. The "Use FrameSet" checkbox will toggle between having the content launched in a wrapper
frameset or launched into its own window from an opener page. It is recommended that the
frameset be used unless the content does not run well when launched under a frameset.