Testing the launch folders and sessions

The Test Launch Folders window is provided for testing purposes. On this window, you can use the built-in Wizard web server, or if the Wizard is installed on a Windows server platform, you can use the Windows IIS web server or any other web server running on the machine.

Prerequisites

Create a site, launch folder, and session. Refer to Creating sites, launch folders, and sessions for more information.

About this task

Testing is a very important part of administering BlueZone Web-to-Host. When you are in the process of creating launch folders and creating and configuring BlueZone emulation client sessions, you want to be able to see the results of your changes immediately. This is accomplished by using the Test BlueZone button.

By design, when you create BlueZone sessions that have the Allow Local Save? check box selected, the BlueZone Web-to-Host Control Module is programmed not to download and overwrite the users’ BlueZone configuration files. This protects any customization changes that the user may have made to their BlueZone configurations. Be aware that files other than the configuration files can be downloaded, only the BlueZone configuration files are prevented from downloading by the enabling of the Allow Local Save? check box.

In theory then, each time you make a BlueZone configuration change, you would have to run ezClear in order for you to see the result of your configuration change.

To eliminate this problem and make it easier to test BlueZone configuration changes, the Web-to-Host Wizard is designed to automatically delete the BlueZone web key in the Windows registry when the Configure button on the Sessions window is used to start and modify a BlueZone session. This forces the downloading of the BlueZone files the next time you use the Test BlueZone button to start a session. This guarantees that you are always immediately presented with your BlueZone configuration changes.

Note: The BlueZone web key is also deleted when the Web-to-Host Wizard program is closed.

Alternatively, if you want to test your sessions as if you were a BlueZone user, do not use the Test BlueZone button, and do not use the server's browser. Instead, go to a completely different machine, open Internet Explorer and type the URL of the launch folder that you are testing.

Tip: The URL for your launch folder can be found in the URL display box on the Test Launch Folders window. The URL display box is located just above the Test BlueZone button. This is the URL that your users will use to access this launch folder as well.

When testing as a user from a separate machine, BlueZone Web-to-Host behaves in the normal fashion. This means that the Web-to-Host Control Module and BlueZone emulation clients only download one time and only download again when these files are updated on the server, or after ezClear is run. BlueZone configuration files download only once; if you make changes to any of your configured BlueZone sessions, the updated configuration files are not download until you run ezClear.

Refer to Running the ezClear Utility for more information.

Procedure

If the Web Server Status is Server Stopped, click Start Web Server to start the web server. The web server attempts to run on a predefined port. If this port is in use, a warning will appear when Start Web Server is clicked. If this happens, choose another port and try again.
Select a site from the Site drop-down list.
Select a launch page from the Launch Page drop-down list.
Choose:
- To launch the default browser to the current URL, click Test BlueZone
- To copy the URL to the clipboard, click the URL box
If the web server is stopped (or if an alternative web server is not running) and you click Test BlueZone, the browser will launch and present an error message. If this happens, start the web server or check your alternative web server.