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Overview of on-demand Sandboxes.

Sandbox or Test Environments are typically isolated from the Production Environment. Usually, client applications are tested against a non-production instance with test data so that testing doesn’t impact the integrity of information in the production & ensure correct data exchange. Salesforce provides an on-demand sandbox model via web service as compared to the legacy process of requesting sandboxes and then getting them enabled, which took many days.

An on-demand sandbox is a public-cloud-based sandbox. When you use on-demand sandboxes, you can expand your sandbox usage when required and roll back usage during slow periods. To access an on-demand sandbox, you must purchase sandbox credits, enable appropriate permissions and users, and configure a client API ID. Then you can use the self-service API to create the sandbox environments yourself. Using the API, you can also control how many on-demand sandboxes you use and how long the on-demand sandboxes are active.

Permissions for creating and managing on-demand sandboxes are integrated with the B2C Commerce Account Manager. When you create an on-demand sandbox, you can specify Open Commerce API and WebDav permissions. You can also specify a time-to live (TTL) value to automatically delete a sandbox after a specified time interval.

With the new model, the merchants are able to perform various actions with the Sandboxes on the fly by making use of REST API. It turns the process Short and enables the merchants to have full control from Create to Delete. The new API model is a “Pay-as-you-use” model. Designated number of seconds are allocated/assigned to every merchant, to be used by the sandboxes either Idle or Running.

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Challenges with Existing API based Swagger Access And Control center

As part of practice, even after provision of efficient management of old and new sandboxes, the new model uses API based interface which favors adaptability towards Developers with sound technical orientation rather than the Merchants who would like to:

• Monitor Sandbox Credits.

• Identify Costly Sandboxes : Identify Sandboxes which are either Idle or Running for a long time without anyone using them – causing ultimate drain of assigned sandbox seconds, violating limitation. In that case, for a typical merchant, the API based interface for creating & managing Sandboxes is not friendly, being so technically complex and having programming language related commands to execute every time. More over the new control center dashboard does not give the complete visibility and ease of managing sandboxes to get optimal gain.

ODS Dashboard Features

• Monitor Created, Idle & Running Sandboxes along with the total consumption of minutes.

• Quickly START, STOP, RESTART, DELETE, RESET,CREATE the sandboxes in a matter of click(s) rather than going through filling of unfriendly inputs to execute a single operation.

• Reports for individual sandboxes with details about points consumption, Diskspace usage, history and operations.

• Adding or removing a sandbox from Scheduler

• Updating Time to live for a Sandbox

• Experience Better Visualization of current status of active Sandboxes.

• View links to sandbox resources

Getting started.

you will need to register along with maximum 5 emails from your organization which will be using the sandbox.

you will receive a confirmation email along with link to dashboard. you can start by sending an email to ods-sfcc@royalcyber.com having subject: “ODS Registration“. you can specify 5 email address from your organization which will be using the dashboard. You will receive confirmation email within 24hrs. Once confirmation email is received you can skip the form below and continue with step1: or alternatively you can fill the form below to request for registration.

Note: you will not be able to access dashboard if you have not registered your emails first using the form below or by email.

Once you get the confirmation email you will need to perform following steps in order to start using.

Step1: Create API Key

In order to use the dashboard you will need to create an On-demand sandbox API key using the following Steps and values.

Configure an API Client ID

To allow users access to the Sandbox API, the administrator uses Account Manager to create an API client ID.

Login to account manager and navigate to API Client and Than create new client using button as in screen shot below.

After Filling in the display name and password make sure Access Control is enabled.

Select your organization as in image below.

You will need to add Sandbox API User role in Roles Section to the API and than select All sandboxes to avoid being kicked out.

Next fill in the Default scope, Redirect URI and other fields same as image below.

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The following table shows same values as in image above to copy and paste.

Step2: Assign Role to User

You will also need to make sure to assign users with role “Sandbox API User” in order for them to access the control panel.

Note: All the users who want to use dashboard need to be have role sandbox API user assigned and access to all sandboxes given in order to use dashboard else it will log user out for now.

Once completed press save and copy the API key generated like in screen shot below.

Step3: Login

Once the API is generated you are now ready to start using the dashboard. Start by navigating the following link odsdashboard.royalcyber.org

Enter the API client key generate in steps above. Once Authenticated user will redirected to Dashboard.

Step4 : Using Features.

1. How to see credits by Realm and use Date range control

2. Monitor Sandboxes

3. Using the Command button

4. Using The status

5. Creating a new Sandbox

6. Edit Existing Sandbox

7. View detailed report on a sandbox.

view Detailed sandbox report including Credits, Usage history, Memory Used and Useful links.

8- Scheduling the Realm and Viewing Existing Configurations.

9- Inbound and Out Bound IP Address for Creating Alias or White listing.

10 - Update Realm Configurations Including Scheduler.

11- Support for multiple Realms handling.

Clients can now configure multiple realms from single place.

12- Added support for Inline Realm Configurations and Schedule if None is defined or configured

13- Added Support for Adding Purchased Credits and Date of Purchase to Calculate Remaining Credits.

This feature helps to auto calculate remaining credits instead of only showing Used Credits. this helps merchants to keep track of remaining credits. Future road map considers upgrading this feature with email alerts for lower remaining credits.

14- Complete Realm Credit Report In Case of Multiple Realms.

If a merchant/vendor is operating multiple Realms, It can now view Aggregated Realm Credit report with option to in place edit/configure purchased credits to view remaining credits per Realm.

Note: please note that the credits per year is prorated based on the month your order form was created and has an end date of Feb 2022. In order to get accurate report please make sure date purchase and total credits purchased are correct.

You can check the order form that you have signed for more information.

Two tables will be visible in this case. One with Realms for whom purchased credits have been added and one without such entry.

15- Sandbox Scheduling

Enables user to schedule sandbox/sandboxes specific to timezones. It allows to schedule sandboxes for different start/stop time and timezones in a same realm. To enable this feature, user first has to follow below steps:

• Client ID authentication.

• Job Schedule.

• Sandbox Schedule.

Client ID Authentication

Use the client ID configured in earlier step for authentication.

Job Schedule

Enables user to schedule job to bring up/down sandboxes based on timezones. Realm can have one job scheduled against each timezone. This allows to create separate jobs to cater sandboxes in different timezones.

Sandbox Schedule

Select Schedule option from Action dropdown.

Modal popup will appear to set schedule sandbox.

Schedule Multiple Sandboxes

Enables user to schedule multiple sandboxes simultaneously using different start/stop date, time and timezone against each of them.

Dashboard with sandboxes schedule details

16- New Menu options to view Road Map and Submit a Bug.

Trouble Shooting

I am redirected to login page. https://odsdashboard.royalcyber.org/?registered=false

Answer: This can happen if you have not registered your emails with Royalcyber. Use the form above to register your emails and get access.

I am redirected to login page suddenly after some time.

Answer: This can happen due to your token expiration or you might not have permission to perform that operation.

I am redirected to login page when i try to perform an operation.

Answer: This can be due to the reason that you are not authorized to perform that action on sandbox.

Feedback

In case you face any problem using the Dashboard feel free to contact via form below. our team will contact you and solve the problem within 24 hrs.

Updates (Q3) 2021

Updates (Q4) 2021

1- Ability to Download Reports As Excel PDF and print for All reports and Tables in dashboard.

2- Updated Realm Credit Report. Ability to view Sandbox Level Credits Report for each Realm

3- Option to Add information for each sandbox in and view it in sandbox Details page.

4- Send Email to Users Assigned to Sandbox (If User Information is configured in above step you can now email them directly from sandbox details page.)

Existing Premium Features List

1. Multi-Realm Handling

2. Multi Realm Aggregated Credits Report.

3. Ability to Export Reports as Excel , PDF etc.

4. Ability to Add information regarding End users and Track for Record purposes.

5. New Report. Track Credits Usage per sandbox bases as a Report.

Future Road Map

Features Q3-2021 – Expected Release Date - August

Q4-2021 To Q2-2022