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Settings Description:

Search by: Select how ACI should find the target application. Either by window title or EXE file name.

Part of the Application's Title: This makes ACI search by window title. This is the main window title of the target application, or part of it. The search is case sensitive so "Notepad" is not the same as "notepad". To verify that ACI is monitoring the correct application after setting this option, check App Title column in ACI Manager main window, which shows the application title that ACI is actually monitoring.

EXE Path Wildcard: This makes ACI search by any part of the executable full path name, which could include wildcards(?, *). ACI itself adds astrisk "*" before and after the text you enter for convenience. The search is not case sensitive so "Notepad.exe" is the same as "notepad.exe". Wildcards supported are "?" to match a single character, and "*" to match zero or more characters.

Example 1: If you enter "MyClient", the following executables would be monitored:

C:\MyClient\Main.exe
C:\MyClient\Main32.exe
C:\MyClient\Reports.exe
C:\Comapny\MyClient.exe
C:\Program Files\MyClient\Main32.exe
C:\Program Files\Comapny\MyClient32.exe
C:\Program Files\Comapny\MyClient\Modules\Reports.exe
D:\Program Files\Comapny\MyClient\Reports.exe

Example 2: If you enter "start.exe", the following executables would be monitored:

C:\MyClient\Start.exe
D:\MyClient\Start.exe
C:\Program Files\MyClient\ERPStart.exe

Note that the third file above would be considered a match by ACI. To avoid this, you can specify "\start.exe" instead of "start.exe". This makes ACI match the backslash character to insure that the specified word appears at the beginning of a file name or folder.

Note that this option is not intended to monitor multiple executables unless these executables are part of the same application group or suite, such as applications that start other executables to perform some aspect of the main application. Usually additional applications require additional licenses. If you have such a multi-EXE application suite, and are not sure whether additional licenses are required, please contact us and provide the name of the application that you plan to use ACI with for details.

Application title contains(case sensitive)/EXE Path(Wildcards accepted): Specify the application title or part of, or the EXE Path or part of here.

Last EXE or Title to close(Ex: Main.exe): This option is used only with applications that start other processes or executables to perform some aspects of the main application, such as applications that show a main menu, but start other executables when you click on certain buttons. For normal applications that consist only of one EXE, leave this field blank. When specified, it tells ACI not to close that EXE unless it's the last one, even if the idle time limit is reached. If the user started other modules in separate processes, such as reports module, it may be undesirable to close the main program unless it's the last one, or in some database applications, if you close the main program, all other modules are closed. If the user had the main program running, and has been working on a report program for a long time without going to the main program, with this option, the main program is not closed unless it's the last one. If you set the idle time limit to 30 minutes for example, and the user has been actively using or checking a report module for the last hour without clicking on the main program, the main program is not closed even though it hasn't been used for an hour. If the user leaves his/her desk for 30 minutes, ACI will close the reports module first, then closes the main program afterward, since it's already past the idle time limit.

This option could be either the exact full title, such as "Main Menu", or the EXE file name, such as "Main.exe". If using the exe file name, make sure that you only include the file name without path and the ".exe" extension.

Delay closing the Last EXE or Title by: This option is ignored if Last EXE or Title to close(Ex: Main.exe) is blank. This option specifies how long ACI should wait after closing all other windows or processes before closing the last executable, or Main Menu application.

Default Idle Time Limit for new users: Specify the Idle Time Limit for new users. Since new users only appear after the user logs on for the first time, it's not possible to set their options before hand, so use this option to specify the default value. This option can be set to high values, such as 24 hours(86400 Seconds), 30 days(2592000 Seconds), or even one year(31536000 Seconds) so you can later sort by Idle Time Limit and see which users are new and configure their settings.

TCP/IP timeout: TCP/IP timeout in seconds.

Auto refresh every: Refresh interval desired, minimum is 1 second. Typically less than Instant refresh after option below. This causes ACI Clients to report application status information to ACI Manager at a frequency specified by this interval. The "Idle Time so far" column count up in ACI Manager main window is emulated and updated according to this interval. Network overhead is typically 200 to 300 bytes every 10 seconds assuming that this option was left at the default value which is 10 seconds. This translates to 20 to 30 Bytes/Second per user.

Instant refresh after: This is used by ACI Client to determine when to notify ACI Manager immediately if the user started to work on the application again. After this interval, the client will be in quick notify mode so you can tell in a fraction of the second(packet latency+ACK) accuracy, whether the user has started working on the application again. For instance, with the default values, the Idle Time so far column is accurate to about 10 seconds when below 60 seconds, and accurate to a fraction of the second when above 60 seconds. So when Idle Time so far is above one minute, it is as shown(± 1 Second). As soon as the user presses a key or clicks on the application, the displayed value in ACI Manager changes to 00:00:00 within milliseconds. This assumes typical network conditions, such as high speed LAN without outages. If you expect network outages, the accuracy becomes ± (TCP/IP timeout + Auto refresh every) seconds.

Ignore Microsoft Internet Explorer: Check to ignore Microsoft Internet Explorer browser windows.

Ignore Netscape: Check to ignore Netscape browser windows.

Enable Navision extensions: This should be enabled for use with Navision software only. In the case of Navision software, it will click Cancel or ESC at every pop window. ACI automatically enables this option when you enter "Navision", "NAV", or "fin" as the application title or executable path.

Allow users to close the most idle user directly: This option enables or disables whether users can close other users' applications directly. When enabled, every client will see a menu item Close most idle user in the icon on the task bar notification area. When the client clicks on that menu item, ACI Manager will look for the most idle copy of the application, excluding those who have the per-user option Allow Close By Others set to "No", and if the idle time for that other user is less than Do not allow closing those who are idle for less than option below. Once a copy is found, ACI tries to close it. If that copy cannot be closed within 10 seconds, ACI will try closing the next most idle one and so on until a copy is closed. Once a copy has been successfully closed, the requesting user is notified with a message "Another application was closed successfully. Try logging on now."

The per-user Allow Close By Others option(at the bottom of ACI Manager main window) allows you to control who is going to be closed. Anyone can use Close most idle user menu item, but only those who have Allow Close By Others set to Yes are closed. Note that the per-user Auto Close option has no effect on Allow Close By Others option. Auto Close affects only Idle Time Limit. Typically you set Allow Close By Others and Auto Close to No for busy users, such as accountants. The only way to close these busy users is from ACI Manager toolbar buttons Close Most Idle, Close App, or ACI Manager shortcut menu Close this App.

Block user from uninstalling ACI Client: When enabled, the user is prevented from uninstalling ACI Client, including Power Users and Administrators. In this case, the following message is shown:

Uninstall is blocked from ACI Manager.
Please contact your network administrator for more information.

This option has immediate effect for all connected clients(shown in colorful icon). To uninstall ACI Client from a specific computer, you need to disable this option first, then uninstall ACI Client. If the client could not connect or join ACI Manager for any reason and this option was enabled previously, then that client is unaware of the change in options. In this case, please contact us for an alternative method for uninstalling ACI Client.

Do not allow closing those who are idle for less than: When Allow users to close the most idle user directly is used, this option prevents other users from closing users that are actively using the target application. For example, you don't want others to close an idle user who was idle for only 10 seconds. This option has no effect when the administrator closes the application manually, or when Idle Time Limit is reached. Setting this option to 0 effectively disables this option.

Suppress All TCP/IP Errors: Disables all TCP/IP errors such as "The connection is reset by remote side." and "Connection is aborted due to timeout or other failure.". In some cases, the first message appear if the user killed ACI Client process. ACI Client prevents its own process from being killed by using Task Manager, except if the user is an Administrator.

Delay closing if the CPU utilization went higher than: When the user runs a task that takes a long time and leaves his or her desk, this option lets ACI wait until the task is finished before closing the application. ACI monitors only the CPU usage for the monitored application, all other applications are ignored. The CPU utilization must be below the percentage set here for at least the specified interval in order for ACI to consider the task finished. Note: Setting this option to the special value 101% disables this option. If you try to close the application manually while the CPU is busy as determined by this setting, ACI Client would reject the request and you get a warning message. There is no need to refresh the display to see up to date information because ACI Client would use up to date CPU Usage data. This feature is not supported for Windows 95/98/ME clients.

Use the same Idle Time for all windows: When enabled, ACI will not close any window or process until the user stops working on all matching windows/processes. All processes in this case will show the same Idle Time and will be closed together. This option is usually enabled for applications that use multiple processes or EXE's to launch different aspects of the same application. When disabled(default), ACI will close unused copies of the application independently based on how the user was working on each copy. For instance, if the user had a copy of the application minimized and didn't notice it, and opened a second copy of the same application, using a second license; ACI will close the older copy first after the Idle Time Limit.

Exit Messages

If the target application shows messages during exit, then you can specify these message here. ACI in this case would click the selected button when it encounter any dialog that is entered here. If ACI encounters a dialog that was not specified here, it would leave the application alone and shows App Status as "Closing" until the user returns and leave the application in closable conditions, or when you add additional dialogs and try to close the application again. You can also use the Remote Control function to see the user's desktop and interact with the application to see why the application is not being closed, and configure ACI as needed. Note that some applications use non-standard Windows dialogs, and ACI may not recognize them. If you have configured ACI correctly, but found that ACI does not click that dialog, please contact us to solve this problem, or customize ACI so it closes your application normally.

Message Text: Enter the message text here, such as "Are you sure you want to exit?". The case is not sensitive. This is the text inside the dialog itself, not the dialog title. You don't have to enter the entire text, just part of it.

Matching Method: Select the desired matching method. Use Exact if you have entered the full text of the message, otherwise use Partial match. If ACI doesn't close the dialog, try using partial match.

Button to click: Select the button that you want ACI to click on.

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