Topology

For Producer to inter-operate smoothly with Harmony Server and its users, we will need to configure the following applications.

• Producer (in the cloud)

• Harmony Server (at the studio)

• WebCC (at the studio)

• Producer Link (on the users’ machines, at the studio or at home)

• Harmony Client (on the users’ machines, at the studio or at home)

The applications involved in the exchange process are the following:

Producer: A web based application usually hosted in the cloud. It acts as a one-stop interface to keep track of the production while at the same time synchronizing with Harmony Server. Users are typically making requests through Producer web interface. Producer then handles requests and communicates with Harmony Server.

Producer Link: Installed on the users’ machines, this desktop application is a complement of the Producer web application. It is used to perform operations that are not permitted by a web application (any tasks requiring direct access to edit local files, such as decompressing a file). We also use Producer Link to configure workspaces (used by Harmony Scripts as well as for uploading assets to Producer), or set up exchange folders when working remotely.

Harmony Server: Located at the studio, Harmony server hosts the Harmony Database. It communicates with Producer via a communication queue between Producer and Web Control Center (WebCC).

WebCC: Installed at the studio, WebCC handles all communications between Producer and Harmony. Communication with Producer is handled via a dedicated message queue. Messages are posted to this queue and processed asynchronously, so that no operation becomes blocking. WebCC needs to be started with specific configuration options to communicate with Producer, for synchronization operations, assembly, as well as for remote (Working From Home) setups.

Harmony (Client): Installed on the users’ machines, Harmony is used to work on scenes. Harmony Scripts bundled with Producer can be installed to update a scene state in Producer directly from Harmony. When working remotely, Harmony Scripts also take care of uploading the scene changes back to the server.