Private Mendix Platform Functionalities - System Administrators
Introduction
In Private Mendix Platform, system administrators primarily manage key settings which must be configured during the initial implementation, and which are rarely modified during normal operation. Settings relevant for systems admins are available in the Settings section of the admin navigation menu.
Accessing the Configuration Settings
As a user with system administrator access rights, you can access the Private Mendix Platform configuration settings by performing the following steps:
- Switch to Admin Mode by clicking the profile picture in the top right corner of the screen and selecting Switch to Admin Mode.
- In the left navigation menu, open the Settings section.
Settings
The Settings section of the administrator navigation menu contains setting relevant to your day-to-day tasks as a system admin. You can use it to manage your branding, license, Marketplace settings, and version control settings.
Some of the settings that you configure here are initially set by the Private Platform Configuration Wizard. System administrators can also update them at any time after the initial configuration.
Preferences
General configuration settings allow you to manage the basic aspects of your Private Mendix Platform, such as the platform name and branding, toggling certain capabilities on or off, and version support settings. The settings in this section are largely configured when you run the initial configuration wizard, but you can still review and adjust them later during the implementation process.
General
The General tab allows you to configure information about your organization, and optionally also the Certified Mendix Partner that is working with you on implementing Private Mendix Platform. You can also use it to configure your locale settings.
Branding
The settings in this section allow you to configure custom branding for your Private Mendix Platform. You can customize the title of the Platform as shown in the top bar, upload your logo, or change the image on the login page. You can also configure an access banner that users will see before, during, or after the login page of your app, for example, to display any information about privacy or security that you want to communicate to your users.
Support
In this section, you can provide your own help and support instructions for users of your Private Mendix Platform.
Users can then see these instructions on the Logs and Events page for their app.
Export Settings
You can export your Private Mendix Platform settings to a JSON configuration file as backup, or to speed up the implementation of new Private Mendix Platform instances.
Settings can only be imported during the initial configuration of the platform. To ensure data integrity and platform stability, you cannot import them into an instance that is already configured and running.
Notifications
Notification settings allow you to manage the notifications generated by Private Mendix Platform. These settings are necessary to ensure that your system can send out notifications.
General
In the current release of Private Mendix Platform, notifications are shown in the Platform itself. In future versions, you will also be able to enable email and push notifications.
Administrative Tasks
In this tab, you can trigger cleaning the scheduled event queue.
Marketplace
For Private Mendix Platform, the Marketplace is also private and hosted entirely within the platform itself. The settings in this section allow you to configure the administrative settings for publishing and downloading content to and from the private Marketplace.
Content Approvals
In this tab, you can configure whether contents that users publish to the private Marketplace requires administrator approval before publishing. To view all pending, published, and rejected content items, click Go to Marketplace Management.
Content Import
You can populate your private Marketplace with contents by importing a zip file that contains the content packages along with a package.json file. You can upload the file from a Content Delivery Network, or manually from your local machine.
Manually Importing Marketplace Content
To manually upload a content bundle from your own computer, perform the following steps:
- Download the Marketplace Bundle with contents available in a zip file. If you do not have access to the bundle, contact your Mendix point of contact.
- Click Upload Marketplace Bundle to go to the Import Content > Upload Marketplace Bundle tab.
- Follow the steps described in Company Administrators.
Importing Marketplace Content from a CDN
To enable content import from a Content Delivery Network, follow these steps:
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Download the Marketplace Bundle with contents available in a zip file. If you do not have access to the bundle, contact your Mendix point of contact.
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Unzip the files to an internal location which Private Mendix Platform can access via HTTP or HTTPS. Do not change the directory structure.
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If using a self-signed certificate for your internal locations, configure Mendix Operator to trust your private Certificate Authorities. For more information, see Obtaining and Configuring the CA Certificate.
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In the Content Import tab, in the Marketplace import bundle URL field, enter the root URL of the package.json file included in the Marketplace download.
For example, if the package.json can be accessed at the URL
https://<your domain>/release/marketplace/Marketplace-1.0/package.json, enter the following URL:https://<your domain>/release/marketplace/Marketplace-1.0/.
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Set the Authentication toggle to ON, and then specify the user name and password required to download the bundle.
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Click Save to enable content import from this bundle.
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Click Go to Marketplace Import to view the available downloads in the Import Content > Import from CDN tab.
Version Settings
In this section, you can perform the following tasks:
- View or disable the versions of Mendix Studio Pro that your users are allowed to download.
- Disable the option to download Studio Pro and patch content from the home page, My Apps page, and Get Studio Pro page.
- Enter instructions for your users on how to request a Studio Pro download.
Integrations
In the Integrations section of the administrator menu, you can configure settings related to identity and access, version control, CI/CD, and others.
Identity & Access
In this section, you can configure SSO authentication for your users logging in to Private Mendix Platform. OIDC and SAML are supported as protocols.
IdP Integration (OIDC)
You can configure SSO authentication with the OIDC protocol. For more information, see Runtime Configuration of Your IdP at Your App.
IdP Integration (SAML)
To configure SSO authentication with the SAML protocol, first configure the service provider in the SP Configuration tab, and then create the IdP-specific settings in the IdP Configuration tab.
To debug the configuration, you can view the log files in the Log tab.
OIDC Provider
The settings under this tab control the connection between Studio Pro and the platform. They should not be changed without advanced knowledge of the platform. Stop and restart the Private Platform portal if you are having trouble logging in with Studio Pro.
SCIM Provisioning
System for Cross-Domain Identity Management (SCIM) is a protocol that simplifies user access management for applications. Private Mendix Platform uses the SCIM standard to pre-provision selected users onto your Platform without the users having to manually log in through SSO first.
To enable SCIM provisioning, perform the following steps:
- Log in to Private Mendix Platform as an administrator.
- In the Authentication section, click the IdP Integration (OIDC) or the IdP Integration (SAML) tab.
- Edit your IdP configuration, and then click the Provisioning tab.
- In the Just in time provisioning section, map the IdP attributes to the matching Mendix object attributes.
- In the Authentication section, click the SCIM Provisioning tab, and then click New.
- In the IDP Configuration Page dialogue, enter a name for the connection, and obtain the token for your identity provider by clicking Copy.
- Enter the token in the configuration panel of your identity provider and verify that the connection is working.
MxAdmin Settings
By default, the platform has a default system administrator account called MxAdmin. You can disable the account by setting the Disable MxAdmin toggle to Yes.
Preferences
You can configure the following preferences for login sessions in Private Mendix Platform:
- Inactivity Period for Automatic Account Disabling (Hours) - The number of hours after which an unused account is disabled; if set to 0, accounts are not automatically disabled
- Maximum Concurrent Sessions Per User Account - The maximum number of concurrent login sessions that users can have; if set to 0, logging in while another session is running (for example, on a different browser or machine) ends the previous session and logs the user off
- Failed Login Attempts to Lockout - The number of failed login attempts after which the user account is locked for the duration specified below; if set to 0, accounts are not automatically locked out
- Account Lockout Duration (Minutes) - The number of minutes after which a locked out account is reactivated; if set to 0, locked out accounts must be reactivated by an administrator
By default, all of these options are disabled (that is, set to a 0 value). To enable any of them, enter a number greater than zero into the corresponding field.
Project Management
You can integrate your Private Mendix Platform with Jira by Atlassian to manage your sprints and roadmap. Enabling the integration links your commits from Mendix Studio Pro directly to your user stories in Jira. The integration requires an active Jira license and a user with admin rights.
To enable the connection, click Connect Jira, and then provide the following information:
- URL of your Jira environment
- Your Jira project key
- User name of a Jira admin user
- API token of a Jira admin user
Version Control
To create applications and collaborate, configure the connection to your version control repository. GitHub, GitLab, Azure DevOps Services, and Bitbucket are supported as version control systems. For more information, see Configuring the Version Control System for Private Mendix Platform.
Build
Settings in this section allow you to configure your CI/CD capabilities and Build pipeline.
Build Utility
Configure CI/CD capabilities for your app. If you enable this option, you must also specify your CI system, configure the necessary settings, and register a Kubernetes cluster. Jenkins, AzureDevops and Kubernetes are supported. You can also configure a custom template for your CI/CD capabilities.
Build Steps
In the Build Steps tab, you can configure the steps that constitute the pipeline.
By default, the Build pipeline consists of the following steps:
Trigger Pipeline > Prepare Build > Start Build > Save Build Artifact > Complete Build
For Kubernetes CI, you can configure the pipeline to include additional steps after the pipeline is triggered, and before the build is completed. These additional steps can include webhook and REST calls, or manual approval for the build.
The Pipeline Type section allows you to designate a pipeline as a main pipeline for all your apps, as well as create draft pipelines which you can use to test or run specific applications. If you designate a pipeline as Draft, you can specify the applications which should use the pipeline. For more information about configuring the pipelines, see Configuring the Pipeline Type.
Configuring the Pipeline Type
Build and Deploy pipelines can be marked as Main or Draft. This lets you test pipeline changes on a single app without disrupting builds and deployments for everything else.
Administrators configuring build templates can see the application names for template selection purposes. Visibility of applications in this dropdown does not grant access to App Management functionality or application administration capabilities.
Managing pipelines and assigning apps requires both the Build and App Management permissions on your role. With both permissions, the Apps dropdown lists every app you have access to, and only those apps. Without App Management, the Apps dropdown is unavailable and you cannot assign an app to a draft pipeline.
Without Build, you cannot create or edit build pipelines. With neither, pipeline management is not available.
Permission changes take effect immediately. If App Management is removed from your role, you can no longer edit the pipeline or see its app in the dropdown.
Main pipelines are the default pipelines for all apps. They apply to all apps in the Apps column. You can have only one main Build pipeline. For Deploy pipelines, you can have one main pipeline for each DTAP environment.
Draft pipelines allow you to configure a targeted override for testing or app-specific needs. They apply to one specific app, or no app. You can have any number of draft pipelines, as long as their scopes do not overlap.
When a build or deployment is triggered, Private Mendix Platform selects the pipeline as follows:
- Build - If the app has a draft pipeline associated with it, that draft is used. Otherwise the main build pipeline is used.
- Deploy - If the app has a draft pipeline that includes the target DTAP environment, that draft is used. Otherwise the main pipeline for that environment is used.
Deploy draft pipelines are scoped per environment. For example, a draft for MyApp covering Test and Acceptance is used for those two environments only. A deployment of MyApp to Production still uses the main Production pipeline.
If no main pipeline is configured, builds and deployments fail with an error.
To create and configure pipelines, perform the following steps:
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To designate a main pipeline, toggle the setting to On. The Apps dropdown is removed and the pipeline shows all apps.
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To designate a pipeline as draft, toggle the setting to Off, and then perform the following steps:
- Select an app project in the Apps dropdown.
- For deploy pipelines, select one or more DTAP environments.
Options already used by another draft pipeline are not available in the dropdown.
Removing a draft pipeline's app association returns that app to the main pipeline for future builds and deployments.
An app can have only one draft Build pipeline. When adding a second draft Build pipeline, you must confirm that you want to move the app from the previous pipeline to current pipeline.
Only one main Build and one main Deploy pipeline must exist at any time. When you toggle a draft pipeline to main, the new pipeline becomes the main pipeline for all apps, and the previous pipeline becomes a draft with no app association. If you toggle a main pipeline to draft, you must select the new main pipeline from the available drafts. If no draft pipeline exist, the system shows a warning state and builds and deployments cannot run until you designate a main pipeline. It is also impossible to delete the main pipeline without selecting another main pipeline first.
You can duplicate your pipelines. All configured steps of a duplicated pipeline are copied into a new pipeline that always starts as a draft, with an empty name, no app association, and the placeholder name New Pipeline. You must specify a name before you can save your changes.
Deployment
Settings in this section allow you to configure your Deployment pipelines.
Deployment Method
Private Mendix Platform supports the following deployment methods:
- Kubernetes Interactor-Agent Mode
- Kubernetes Standalone Mode
Deployment Steps
In the Deployment Steps tab, you can configure the steps that constitute the pipeline.
By default, the Deploy pipeline consists of the following steps:
Trigger Pipeline > Get Deployment Artifact > Deploy App > Complete Deployment
You can configure the pipeline to include additional steps after each default step. These additional steps can include webhook and REST calls, or manual approval for the build.
You can also configure the pipeline to take into consideration the type of changes. Selecting the Changes/updates to an app environment check box allows you to bypass the deployment steps and instead simply restart the app in case of changes to the app environment (such as the app constants or the number of replicas).
The Pipeline Type section allows you to designate a pipeline as a main pipeline for all your apps, as well as create draft pipelines which you can use to test or run specific applications. If you designate a pipeline as Draft, you can specify the applications which should use the pipeline, as well as the DTAP purpose (that is, whether it is used for Acceptance, Deployment, or Testing). For more information about configuring the pipelines, see Configuring the Pipeline Type.
Security
To help fulfill compliance requirements related to account control, Private Mendix Platform now supports disabling the default MxAdmin account for apps at deployment. This setting effectively removes the ability to access the app using the default system admin account, and is only recommended when combined with default use of an SSO module to avoid lockout.
Settings
In the Settings tab, you can customize the resource presets by specifying each preset's request and limit values for CPU and memory.
Advanced
In this section, you can adjust the advanced configuration settings of your Private Mendix Platform.
Capabilities
The settings in this section allow you to configure the basic aspects of your Private Mendix Platform:
- Enable App Projects? - Recommended. Enables you to create and manage your app projects. Enables app projects and related settings across the portal. Must be enabled for CI/CD capabilities.
- Enable Marketplace? - Recommended. Enables you to use the Private Platform's Marketplace capabilities to upload, import and manage Marketplace contents. The Marketplace enabled here is hosted entirely within your Private Mendix Platform.
- Enable Build and Deploy - Recommended. Enables you to use the Private Platform's CI/CD capabilities to build and deploy apps. Enables the Build and Deploy pipeline, environments, metrics, logging, and related settings.
- Enable Identity & Access Integration? - Optional. Enable users to log in using SSO by configuring your IdP integration.
- Allow sign up? - Optional. Enable users to log in with a local user account, instead of or in addition to SSO.
- Enable Webhooks? - Optional. Webhooks allow to send information between platform and external systems, and can be triggered by events around Apps, Users, Groups, Marketplace and CI/CD.
- Enable License Management? - Recommended. Upload your license bundle to automatically provision app licenses through Private Cloud License Manager. For more information, see Private Cloud License Manager.
Operational
In this section, you can access the list of scheduled events and the Mx Model Reflection tool.
Scheduled Event
This tab shows a list of all the scheduled tasks and actions in the system, together with start time, end time, and status.
Mx Model Reflection
For more information about this platform-supported module, refer to Mx Model Reflection.