Content Intermediation Engine

CIE Overview

One of the core technologies that Pulse Connect Secure offers is the Content Intermediation Engine (CIE), a highly advanced parser and rewriter. The CIE retrieves Web-based content from internal Web servers and changes URL references and Java socket calls so that all network references point to Pulse Connect Secure.

For instance, when an authenticated user clicks a link, the request goes to Pulse Connect Secure. Pulse Connect Secure performs intermediation by parsing the incoming link to determine the internal destination server and then forwarding the request to that internal server on behalf of the end-user. In other words, Pulse Connect Secure acts as the internal server to the end-user and acts as an end-user to the internal server. This intermediation process provides protection and clear separation between end-users and internal resources.

In order to successfully intermediate Web applications, the CIE must successfully locate all links within a page and rewrite them accurately. The CIE guide provides guidelines to Web application developers and user interface designers for creating Web applications that the CIE can successfully intermediate. The document provides general recommendations, lists the content-types that Pulse Connect Secure supports, the level of support that Pulse Connect Secure provides for each of the content types, and the language constructs to avoid.

The Content Intermediation Engine does not intermediate all types of links. For instance, it does not intermediate ftp, rtsp, mms, and mailto links.

Content Types Supported Through the CIE

The Content Intermediation Engine fully supports Web applications written in standard HTML, JavaScript, VBscript, and Java. There are a few corner cases, however, in which these content types are sensitive to intermediation and parsing. If this document does not contain information about a content type, the Content Intermediation Engine does not officially support it, but the content type may still work through Pulse Connect Secure.