MEDIA SHUTTLE THE EASY WAY TO RELIABLY AND SECURELY SEND ANY SIZE FILE, ANYWHERE, FAST. PRODUCT WHITE PAPER WHAT DO 100,000 GLOBAL USERS OF MEDIA SHUTTLE KNOW THAT YOU DON’T?
MEDIA SHUTTLE THE EASY WAY TO RELIABLY AND SECURELY
SEND ANY SIZE FILE, ANYWHERE, FAST.
PRODUCT WHITE PAPER
WHAT DO 100,000 GLOBAL USERS OF MEDIA SHUTTLE KNOW THAT YOU DON’T?
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Media Shuttle — The World’s First Hybrid SaaS File Movement Solution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Cloud Technology — The Enabler Powering Media Shuttle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Conventional File Movement Approaches — And Why They Don’t Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
The Growing Challenge of a Data-Driven World — Why You Need Media Shuttle . . . . . . . . . . 5
Signiant Intelligent File Movement — The First Revolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Acceleration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Reliability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Scale-out Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Media Shuttle: Hybrid SaaS for “Hands-On” File Movement — The Second Revolution . . . . . 8
How Media Shuttle Works — The Technical Perspective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
System Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
IT Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Multi-layered Security — Defense in Depth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Media Shuttle in Action — The Operational Perspective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Media Shuttle Economics — The Business Perspective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Additional Media Shuttle Options — More Power, More Flexibility, More Cloud . . . . . . . . . . 15
Media Shuttle for Enterprises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Media Shuttle with Cloud Object Storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Web Transfer API for Embedded Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Who Should Use Media Shuttle? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
About Signiant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
SEND ANY SIZE FILE,
ANYWHERE, FAST.
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INTRODUCTIONThe information revolution, and the data explosion that has
accompanied it, has transformed the world — and in turn
increased the need for people to send and share digital information
across a now massively interconnected world . Businesses of every
size need to move ever more data, over ever greater distances,
at ever faster speeds . The parallel advances in computer storage,
networking, and processing have all enabled this transformation,
but a bottleneck has been left at the core of the standard transport
layer of this global digital ecosystem . The Internet Protocol (IP)
networks that carry the traffic aren’t being used optimally for
sending large data sets over long distances, and enterprises
needing to send large files quickly, easily, safely, and reliably face
an ongoing challenge .
This document presents a detailed review of how Signiant’s
Media Shuttle addresses this challenge for anyone who needs
to move large, high-value digital assets around the world . Media
Shuttle incorporates the speed, security and reliability of Signiant’s
industry-leading intelligent file movement technology, which moves
files up to 200 times faster than standard IP transfers, and delivers
these benefits via a unique, patented hybrid Software-as-a-Service
(SaaS) architecture . The Media Shuttle user interfaces and control
functions are delivered by Signiant from the cloud, while high-value,
proprietary content remains securely under the customer’s control
— either in on-premises storage or in the customer’s cloud storage
tenancy . This best-of-both-worlds approach offers numerous
benefits .
With its SaaS control layer, Media Shuttle is simple to deploy and
requires almost no customer maintenance . End users and system
administrators access Shuttle’s capabilities via a set of configurable
and easy to use role- and task-based web interfaces, all hosted
in the cloud by Signiant . Client-side software is always kept up
to date, new features and functions are pushed out on a regular
basis, and the customer doesn’t need to operate web servers .
This functionality is all available within an auto-scaling solution that
adapts to changing needs, and it is continuously available from
anywhere in the world . Media Shuttle’s built-in flexibility supports
diverse industries, use cases, operational workflows, and data
types .
At the center of the Media Shuttle value proposition is the end
user, the person who simply wants to send a big file, fast . Users
love Shuttle’s polished, branded web portals and super-simple
interface — and this keeps them coming back . When Media Shuttle
is available, the user community won’t gravitate to rogue file-sharing
tools that can put valuable data at risk .
Other stakeholders also benefit from this attention to user
experience . Signiant understands the importance of placing control
with the people who most need it, while offloading it from the people
who don’t . Media Shuttle enables a clear segregation between IT-
centric core technology policy and infrastructure management, and
the more dynamic operational administration of users, content flow
and access . Two different control interfaces meet the needs of these
two groups .
Further recognizing that one size really doesn’t fit all, Signiant sells
Media Shuttle on a subscription basis with tiered pricing based
on the number of active users . The same technical offering can
thus provide a cost-effective solution for any size customer, from a
boutique advertising agency or special effects house to a Fortune
The World’s First Hybrid SaaS File Movement Solution
FIGURE 1 . MEDIA SHUTTLE SEND PORTAL USER INTERFACE
HOW BIG IS A LARGE FILE? Signiant technology makes a meaningful difference for any single file over about 500MBytes . It also works for large sets of small files .
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500 media or technology giant . Meeting the price-sensitive and
time-critical demands of the modern enterprise, Media Shuttle
removes the high up-front CAPEX investment, slow deployment
times and ongoing IT support and maintenance effort typical of a
major new technology implementation . Media Shuttle offers instead
a lower cost “pay-as-you-go” OPEX solution, a fully functional
deployment measured in weeks, not months (or years), and minimal
in-house IT maintenance and support requirements .
CLOUD TECHNOLOGY — THE ENABLER POWERING MEDIA SHUTTLEToday’s proliferation of IaaS, PaaS and SaaS offerings makes it
easy to forget how unimaginable “the cloud” was even ten years
ago . On the infrastructure side, cloud computing and object
storage have enabled a radical rethinking of how data-heavy
computing tasks and storage requirements are managed . By
providing convenient, on-demand access to configurable pools
of shared resources, public cloud providers have created powerful
new options for data processing and storage . Today’s businesses
are able to take advantage of the cloud to reduce their upfront
infrastructure costs, for example building on-premises storage and/
or compute capacity for steady-state utilization levels, with overflow
to elastic cloud resources for peak demand .
While IaaS offerings from cloud providers present obvious
opportunities, today’s businesses are also deriving enormous
benefit from SaaS solutions that are built on public cloud platforms .
By employing PaaS tools and the global reach of cloud platforms,
companies like Signiant can develop and operate scalable software
platforms on behalf of their customers . SaaS solutions enable
enterprises to get their business-critical applications up and running
much faster . And with a greatly reduced technology maintenance
burden, IT professionals can focus on core business differentiation
and growth tasks . True SaaS solutions offer on-demand scaling,
making it possible to rapidly adapt resources to unpredictable and
changing business needs .
Media Shuttle is the first accelerated file movement solution to
leverage these advantages and offer a true native-formed SaaS
solution . Built from the ground up to take advantage of all that the cloud has to offer, true SaaS is designed to be hosted in the
cloud from the beginning . Via a multi-tenant architecture with
multiple levels of redundancy and resiliency, customers are given
a virtualized infrastructure that is maintained and managed by the
vendor . Customer IT departments never need to download and
install upgrades — or maintain outdated versions — since the
application is automatically upgraded via the cloud .
It is important to distinguish true SaaS from “cloud washed”
solutions, which simply take legacy on-premises software and run
it on virtual machines in the cloud . There are certainly situations
where this is a legitimate thing to do, but it isn’t SaaS . Only true
cloud-native SaaS solutions, like Media Shuttle, offer the benefits
of high availability, scalability, and global performance .
CONVENTIONAL FILE MOVEMENT APPROACHES — AND WHY THEY DON’T WORKTraditional methods of sending and sharing data over IP networks
rely on a networking protocol known as Transport Control Protocol
(TCP) . TCP — and the data communication protocols such as
Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) and File Transfer Protocol (FTP)
that are built on it — works well for sending small files of any type
over the Internet . However, TCP does not deal well with the high
latency and packet loss of long-distance networks . The back-and-
forth acknowledgment mechanism that TCP is based on becomes
impractical for sending large amounts of data around the world .
The four-decade-old FTP is widely utilized for sending large files, but
it is built on the same TCP foundation and suffers from the same
limitations when latency is high . Additionally, at least in its popular
“free” forms, FTP fails to adequately address issues of ease of use,
security, and management . Commercial versions of FTP software
HIGH AVAILABILITY
COST EFFECTIVENESS
SCALABILITY
IS IT TRUE CLOUD-NATIVE SAAS?LOOK FOR THESE KEY BENEFITS
EASY TO DEPLOY & USE
GLOBAL PERFORMANCE
RAPID INNOVATION
CLOUD TERMS
INFRASTRUCTURE-AS-A-SERVICE (IAAS) refers to hosted storage, servers (virtual machines) and networking
PLATFORM-AS-A-SERVICE (PAAS) offerings are cloud-hosted tools that can be leveraged to build something; examples included database, email service, and DNS
SOFTWARE-AS-A-SERVICE (SAAS) offerings are complete software applications delivered by the software vendor from the cloud
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attempt to address these latter issues, but do so through more
costly, complicated, and hard to deploy and support solutions . Such
solutions add to the learning curve for users and to the workload of
IT staff, while doing nothing to address the core issue of latency .
A common approach to solving the throughput problem — one
based on widespread misconceptions and misleading claims by
network providers — is to purchase more bandwidth . But this
approach fails to address the underlying limitation of TCP that
results in extremely inefficient usage of increased bandwidth in
high-latency scenarios . In fact, more bandwidth makes literally
no difference in many practical situations: above a minimum
bandwidth-latency product threshold in the presence of packet
loss, TCP throughput is a linear function of latency and is
completely independent of bandwidth . So it is quite likely that the
transfer time for a given file will be exactly the same over the higher-
bandwidth connection . In short, simply buying more bandwidth can
be the very definition of throwing good money after bad .
The more recently introduced online file sharing (OFS) and
enterprise file share & sync (EFSS) services leverage cloud
technology, and have been embraced by consumers largely
because they deal well with the issue of usability . But these
services still rely on TCP, thereby incurring the same slow delivery
problems with large files . And many of these services, which are
optimized for document sharing, place file size limits on users .
Such solutions also introduce major security, control, support, and
manageability issues inside the enterprise, often violating company
policies by placing proprietary business data outside of corporate
controls and visibility . For this reason, corporate IT departments
increasingly ban use of such services . So, at best, these solutions
simply create more challenges for an already overworked IT staff as
they attempt to reconcile user requirements with the imperative to
protect the organization’s valuable data .
THE GROWING CHALLENGE OF A DATA-DRIVEN WORLD —WHY YOU NEED MEDIA SHUTTLEWith their data-heavy video files and distributed content supply
chains, Media & Entertainment companies were among the first to
address the challenge of transferring large files over long distances .
And video isn’t just for media companies anymore . Technological
advances and the accessibility of video creation tools have led to
the ubiquity of video as a preferred medium for communications
of all kinds, across all industries . With the move to HD, then to 4k
video and beyond, video files continue to get bigger . Whether for
training, marketing, or employee communications, most companies
now use video and also face the challenge of moving it .
Alongside the video explosion, the large-file-movement problem
has grown to encompass other classes of unstructured data
(data not organized into relational databases), beyond just
video . Technological drivers have led to a proliferation of large
unstructured data types — from earth science and medical data,
satellite imagery and maps, to business “big data” of all kinds . The
emergence of massively scalable cloud-based object storage and
big data applications such as Hadoop MapReduce also add to this
exponential data growth .
The International Data Corporation (IDC) estimates that by 2020 the
size of world’s digital data will be nearly 40 Zetabytes, a 50-fold
growth from the beginning of 2010 . Most of this new content
(up to 95%) will be unstructured data . Moreover, this growth is
asymmetrical, with large files disproportionately accounting for
growing data storage needs . According to a 2015 study by Nasuni
Corporation of enterprises utilizing cloud storage, while large files
(over 1GB) represent only 0 .1% of the total number of files stored,
they represent 27% of the total storage used .
Three other trends compound the challenge of data growth:
tightening deadlines and the need for speed in a competitive world;
increasing globalization and the need to move and share ever
more data across ever greater distances; and growing cybercrime
and the need for robust data security, at all points in its lifecycle,
including during transit .
Traditional methods of file movement cannot meet the challenge of
sending large files easily, reliably and securely over distance, and
these critical shortcomings are becoming much more of a core
business problem . What is needed is a radically different approach;
the kind offered by Signiant’s revolutionary Media Shuttle .
NETWORK TERMS
BANDWIDTH is the maximum rate that data can be transfered (typically measured in bits/second)
THROUGHPUT is the actual rate that data is transfered
LATENCY is the delay between a data sender and receiver; latency is impacted by both distance and processing time at any nodes the data transverses
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18 HRS
12 HRS
6 HRS
FIGURE 3 . TIME TO TRANSFER 1 HR OF HD CONTENT (ENCODED @50 Mbps AVC-21GB)
100 Mbps
TCP Signiant
LA Metro 1:28 0:32LA to NY 5:38 0:32LA to London 10:59 0:32LA to Singapore 21:05 0:32
TCP SIGNIANT
500 Mbps
TCP Signiant
LA Metro 1:28 0:06LA to NY 5:38 0:06LA to London 10:59 0:06LA to Singapore 21:05 0:06
TCP SIGNIANT
1 GBPS
TCP Signiant
LA Metro 1:28 0:03LA to NY 5:38 0:03LA to London 10:59 0:03LA to Singapore 21:05 0:03
TCP SIGNIANT
Signiant Intelligent File Movement — The First RevolutionMedia Shuttle is built on the same powerful technology platform as
all Signiant products; a platform that companies like Disney, Fox,
the NFL, and many others rely on to securely move their files . The
combined technological features of this platform enable any size file
of any type to be sent over any distance quickly, reliably and securely .
ACCELERATIONSigniant’s proprietary acceleration protocol transfers files up to
200x faster than standard TCP-based transmission . It does this
by minimizing the impact of latency so that the entire bandwidth of
the connection can be fully utilized . Signiant technology therefore
has the greatest impact for a high-bandwidth, high-latency (long
distance) connection — as shown in the figure 2 (below) in green .
Another way of visualizing the performance improvement is
to compare Signiant transfers with TCP transfers over various
distances, and to then repeat this comparison for different
bandwidth connections . As shown below, with TCP the file transfer
takes proportionally longer as distance/latency increases and
packet loss occurs . With Signiant, not only is the transfer time much
shorter, it’s also independent of distance — and as more bandwidth
is added the Signiant transfer time gets proportionally faster .
Signiant achieves this performance by utilizing a proprietary transport
protocol deployed on top of UDP (User Datagram Protocol) that
enhances it in significant ways . UDP enables chunks of data to be
sent on a best-effort basis that removes the TCP overhead of back-
and-forth handshaking between the two ends of the IP transmission
path — but it does so by foregoing reliability . The Signiant protocol
implements functionality on top of UDP that restores reliability in a
TCP-like way, but with the following improvements:
➜➜ Flow control ensures that data is transmitted at the optimal rate for the receiver .
➜➜ Congestion control detects when the network is being overloaded and adapts accordingly .
➜➜ Reliability mechanisms make sure that data loss due to congestion or other network factors is compensated for and that the order of the stream of data is maintained .
One fundamental problem with TCP is that it uses a relatively
unsophisticated sliding window mechanism, sending only a certain
amount of data over the network before it expects that data to be
acknowledged as received . As TCP receives acknowledgments,
it advances its window and sends more data . If the data doesn’t
get through or an acknowledgment is lost, TCP will time out and
retransmit from the last acknowledged point in the data stream with
a reduced window size . There are a number of problems with this,
such as retransmitting data that may have already been received,
or long stalls in data sent while waiting on acknowledgments .
Signiant uses a mechanism similar to a sliding window, but the
mechanism incorporates two key improvements over traditional
TCP: adaptive window size and selective acknowledgment . Adaptive
window size is a mechanism that measures the capacity of the
network and the round trip distance . It then uses a window that’s
big enough to keep data in flight on the network at all the times .
Selective acknowledgment allows the endpoint to verify which
pieces of the transmission have been received so that any section
that is missing — even one in the middle of the data set — can be
retransmitted rather than the entire data set .
FIGURE 2 . SIGNIANT VS. TCP-BASED TRANSMISSIONS
0
50 Mb 1 GB 20 GB
6
TR
AN
SF
ER
TIM
E (
HR
S) 12
DATA PAYLOAD
UP TO 200X FASTER
GREEN = 1 GBPS LINK LA TO SINGAPOREBLUE = 100 Mbps LINK LA TO NY
No Signiant
No Signiant
SigniantSigniant
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Signiant is constantly measuring effective throughput, network
latency and loss, and building a history . By maintaining a history, it
is possible to see how all of these factors are changing over time,
and network congestion can be located by analyzing the frequency
of changes . This allows the Signiant protocol to adapt to network
conditions much more effectively than TCP, which employs pure
additive-increase/multiplicative-decrease window size changes in
response to point-in-time packet loss .
In addition to advanced TCP-like functions, Signiant’s transfer
protocol also adds enhanced FTP-like functions to the UDP
foundation . With FTP each file sent requires its own set of
command and response interactions, and its own TCP connection .
The Signiant protocol reduces this high per-file overhead by
communicating about files being transferred more efficiently, and
multiplexing the transmission of files over a single channel, thereby
enabling file operations to be performed in parallel .
Signiant’s transport functionality operates under a client-server
model, where one or more clients request services from a central
server . In order to execute the file transfer itself, both the source
and destination computers must have an instance of the Signiant
software that implements the proprietary protocol for data
movement .
RELIABILITYIn addition to the various protocol-level reliability mechanisms noted
in the prior section, Signiant includes a feature called Checkpoint
Restart in all of its products . Checkpoint Restart adds a layer of fault
tolerance into any transfer by ensuring that if a transfer is interrupted
for any reason (from network failure to application or OS crashes)
the transmission will automatically restart after recovery from the
point at which it was interrupted, with no loss of data . This adds not
only reliability but also efficiency to the overall transfer process by
avoiding the need to start at the beginning again after a failure .
SECURITYTransport Layer Security (TLS) is built in as a core component of
the Signiant transfer protocol software stack and provides the
base layer of security in all Signiant tools . TLS is the standard
cryptographic protocol designed to provide communication security,
privacy and data integrity over IP networks . Encryption mechanisms
provided by TLS are used to secure data as it is transmitted with
regards to data transfer, advanced authentication, data integrity,
and data confidentiality . All transfers conducted through the Signiant
transfer protocol are encrypted, appropriately authenticated,
authorized and tracked, including proof that files were delivered
thereby ensuring non-repudiation (protection against denial of
performing an action) . Additional layers of service and application
security are added to the individual Signiant products on the
management, control and end-user components specific to each .
SCALE-OUT MANAGEMENTWhile there are other products on the market that accelerate
file transfers, only Signiant solutions are designed to operate
at scale . By developing systems that include unified control,
automation, and bandwidth management capabilities, Signiant
made it practical to manage very large numbers of endpoints and
transfers . Signiant’s flagship Manager+Agents product led the way
in scale-out management, and remains the gold standard today
for scheduled, unattended delivery of large data sets . The following
Manager+Agents system elements enable large-scale deployments:
➜➜ Control & Monitoring Console: Signiant systems provide a dashboard that allows IT to monitor and manage all file transfer activity on a global network .
➜➜ Centralized Configuration: As systems scale up, it becomes impractical to separately configure a large number of file transfer endpoints . The Manager+Agents system is based on a central policy engine and database, allowing configuration parameters to be automatically propagated to each endpoint .
➜➜ Workflow Automation: Signiant was the leader in developing reusable components and templates for automation of file transfer workflows and integration with other system compo-nents . As the media industry has moved to a standards-based approach to workflow automation, Signiant has played an active role in the Framework for Interoperable Media Services (FIMS) initiative of AMWA and the EBU to standardize service interfaces .
➜➜ Bandwidth Management: The Manager+Agents product includes adjustable settings for WAN acceleration and bandwidth ranges based on upper limit ceilings and lower limit floors . These tools facilitate predictable transfer times and prevent overloading of the network . Administrators also have the ability to prioritize delivery of assets based on business needs and content delivery windows . As content priorities change, the queue can be adjusted to move more critical jobs to the top, while jobs with less urgent timelines remain lower in the queue .
While not all of this advanced functionality is included in the Media
Shuttle solution, Signiant’s legacy of building highly sophisticated
enterprise systems has informed its design . And it is important to
note that many Signiant customers employ both solutions within
their businesses: Manager+Agents for automated system-to-system
transfers, and Media Shuttle when people are involved .
FIGURE 4 . CLIENT/SERVER ARCHITECTURE
CLIENTSERVER
FILE TRANSFER SOFTWARE
FILE TRANSFER SOFTWARE
File movement
Request
Respond
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Signiant’s first-generation products laid a strong technical
foundation and established the company as the market leader
in advanced movement of large data sets . But an important and
growing group of stakeholders wanted something more: end users
desired an easy-to-use interface reminiscent of online file-sharing
services, combined with the power of Signiant technology . This
market need, combined with the advent of cloud technology, led to
the development of Media Shuttle — Signiant’s flagship product for
“hands-on” file movement, as opposed to automated and batch file
movements better supported by the Manager+Agents and Flight
products . “Hands-on” file movement is shorthand here for any
person-to-person, or project-based, sending and sharing of files .
From an end user perspective, Media Shuttle is a simple tool
accessed by opening a browser and going to a defined URL . The
user is presented with a branded portal with an intuitive interface,
in one of three forms:
➜➜ SEND (as shown in Figure 1) portals let the user send a file to another person in a store-&-forward model . Email notifications advise the recipient when a file is ready for download, and advise the sender (and other stakeholders) when the file has been downloaded .
➜➜ SHARE (as shown in Figure 6) portals allow multiple users to browse, upload to, and download from a file structure in a fixed storage location .
➜➜ SUBMIT portals funnel all user submissions to a fixed storage location, for simple aggregation purposes and/or to be picked up by an automated process .
Media Shuttle is completely agnostic with respect to data type, file
size, network type, distance of transfer, and geographic location .
Running on the customers’ existing WAN infrastructure, whether
dedicated links or open Internet, Media Shuttle will always provide
the same maximum possible speeds enabled by the Signiant
transfer protocol, regardless of network conditions .
Most organizations comprise different classes of stakeholders with
different needs and concerns . Media Shuttle provides a solution
that offers features and benefits for all: IT staff responsible for
provisioning, supporting and securing the technical environment;
operational managers and end-users performing the bulk of the
actual data-centric work; and business decision-makers defining
organizational objectives and needs .
HOW MEDIA SHUTTLE WORKS — THE TECHNICAL PERSPECTIVESystem Architecture Media Shuttle incorporates the same acceleration, reliability and
security technology as all Signiant products, delivered as a hybrid
SaaS — meaning that part of the system is on-premises, and part
is delivered by Signiant from the cloud . This contemporary new
architecture extends and enhances the core transport functionality
to create an easy to use, simple to deploy solution for people to
send and share large (or any size) files .
A Media Shuttle deployment is shown in Figure 5 . At the core of
the system are a server (running Signiant software) and storage
Media Shuttle: Hybrid SaaS for “Hands-On” File Movement — The Second Revolution
CLOUD
ON-PREMISES/ CUSTOMER NETWORK
• WEB INTERFACE • EMAIL NOTIFICATIONS• CLIENT UPDATES• FILE TRANSFER LOGISTICS• DATA COLLECTION
END USEREND USEROPS/ADMINIT
INTERNET (OR CUSTOMER NETWORK)
FIGURE 5 . MEDIA SHUTTLE HYBRID SaaS ARCHITECTURE
CUSTOMER’S ON-PREMISES STORAGE
CUSTOMER’S SERVER
RUNNING SIGNIANT FILE
TRANSFER SOFTWARE
SIGNIANT CONTROLLAYER SaaS
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on the customer’s network . This storage is the repository for data
that users want to share, and/or the place where data is cached in
a store-and-forward model for a person-to-person transfer . This is
an important aspect of Signiant’s differentiated value — the data is
in a storage location that is always under the customer’s direct
control . (Yes, this storage can be in the cloud . More on that later
on page 16 .)
The SaaS part of the architecture, which is shown in blue in Figure 5,
is where file transfer logistics are managed, user activity is tracked,
and user web interfaces are hosted . It is a fully managed solution
where Signiant administers all the backend technical tasks such as
load balancing, web server management, and software upgrades .
This SaaS component orchestrates the entire system via Internet
connections and provides the web interfaces that enable people
to interact with it, as indicated by the blue lines on the diagram .
To send or share files, end users interact with the system through
simple branded portals that are accessed via a web browser . As
discussed on page 7, each end user’s laptop or desktop computer
must be equipped with client-side file transfer software to handle
the data movement . This software, known as the Signiant App,
is provided as a native Windows or Mac OS desktop application
that requires a straightforward one-time installation on the user’s
machine . Once the App software is in place, the user can simply
access a Media Shuttle portal via a web page provided by the
Signiant SaaS — and start sending and sharing files . As shown by
the green lines on the diagram, data is moved between the client
and server storage locations via the associated computers running
Signiant file transfer software . The file transfer client is also available
as an iOS app for mobile devices available from the Apple App Store .
Media Shuttle management interfaces (both IT and Ops/Admin)
are provided as web pages, hosted by web servers provided and
managed by Signiant as part of the Media Shuttle SaaS . These
interfaces are accessed through standard web browsers (Chrome,
Firefox, Safari, Edge, and Internet Explorer) and provide for the set-
up, configuration and administration of portals . The management
consoles are pure web interfaces requiring no plug-ins or native
applications .
Taking a big-picture view of the system, the green and gray parts
of the Figure 5, where the data movement itself is happening, can
be referred to as the ‘data plane’ . The Signiant SaaS is the ‘control
plane’, orchestrating the entire system . This separation of the data
plane from the control plane is one of the key technical innovations
of Media Shuttle, allowing customers to retain control of their
content while simultaneously benefiting from the power of SaaS .
IT Considerations Media Shuttle is a fully enterprise-ready solution that is used by
some of the world’s largest corporations to handle their most
valuable content . But the hybrid SaaS architecture and affordable
price point also make it accessible to very small companies . In
both scenarios, the concerns of the IT professionals responsible
for overseeing the system were carefully considered and the system
is optimized for their needs .
A key concept for all Signiant products is the principle of “storage
independence” . Customers have the freedom and flexibility to select
any storage type and location, on-premises or in the cloud, from the
storage vendor(s) of their choice . One immediate IT benefit of this
design is that Media Shuttle can be deployed without the need to
modify, replace or add to the existing enterprise infrastructure . The
only customer hardware requirement, beyond access to the storage
and correct network and firewall configuration, is a server on which
to install the transfer software . If more throughput or system
redundancy is required, or if storage is geographically distributed,
additional servers can be installed — and Signiant provides the
additional server software free of charge .
Installation and set-up of the server software is done remotely by
the Signiant deployment team, working with the customer’s IT staff .
During the initial set-up session, the Signiant team can also assist
with configuration of the customer’s network router to support Port
Forwarding, and configuration of the required ports for outbound
and inbound traffic . Once the server and client software is installed,
all that IT staff need to do is create and baseline configure the
user-facing portals from within the IT web interface — a process
that can be done in minutes . Portals can be one of three types:
Send portals for person-to-person sending of files to one or more
sender-selected, named individuals; Submit portals for multiple
users submitting files to pre-defined folders; and Share portals for
multiple users uploading/downloading files to/from pre-defined
storage folders configured for shared access . A typical Media
Shuttle system is installed, fully deployed and in use by operational
staff within days of signing a contract .
BROWSER PLUG-INS
Signiant’s client-side file transfer software was traditionally delivered
to end users via a downloadable web browser NPAPI plug-in that
extended browser functionality to include accelerated file transfers.
As Google Chrome and other web browsers withdrew support for
NPAPI-plug-ins, Signiant migrated the file transfer functionality to
a native application, the Signiant App. The browser interface now
communicates with the installed app, and from the end-user
perspective there is no difference in the file transfer experience.
10 | MEDIA SHUTTLE PRODUCT WHITE PAPER | WWW.SIGNIANT.COM
FIGURE 6: MEDIA SHUTTLE SHARE PORTAL USER INTERFACE
Once the system is up and running, IT staff receive the full benefits
of a multi-tenant SaaS solution: it is fully maintained and supported
by Signiant, automatically upgraded with no downtime, and steadily
delivers innovative new features . As a multi-tenant SaaS, Media
Shuttle provides the scalability (more users and more transfers),
elasticity (immediately auto-scale up and down as needed) and
high availability (guaranteed performance at any scale) of a true
cloud platform .
In addition to ease of deployment, support and maintenance,
Media Shuttle offers a number of other benefits to customer IT staff:
➜➜ Control and Visibility: Media Shuttle provides three different user interfaces for three different classes of users: an IT interface for IT users, an Administration (or Ops/Admin) interface for Operations Managers, and a User interface for end-users that instantiates one of the three classes of portal supported (Send, Submit and Share) .
The IT interface allows the technical administrator to create new user-facing portals, define, configure and manage all aspects of the storage and network infrastructure, set limits on file sizes and the lifespan of user portals, and apply whatever other constraints and controls are needed . More advanced settings allow for sophisticated control over areas such as traffic routing, server load balancing, and permissions for working with non-members of a portal . The Administration (Ops/Admin) interface is a dashboard that gives full visibility over the usage of the portal (members, number of files transferred over time, largest files transferred, etc .) . Additional capabilities allow for viewing and exporting (as .csv files) all portal events and transactions, including the full history of which files were transferred, when and by whom .
➜➜ Delegated Administration: Delegated administration is a concept that benefits IT staff and operations managers equally . From within the IT interface, IT staff can delegate full administration rights over a portal to another user — typically an operations manager or project manager . Via the separate streamlined Ops/Admin interface, this designated manager can then add and remove users, monitor content flow, and change the portal design . This model ensures that IT retains control of key network and storage parameters, but absolves them of the need to spend time reconfiguring portals based on what are essentially non-technical, operational decisions . IT is freed up to focus on core technical tasks, while operational staff can make real-time operating decisions without needing to wait for IT to execute on their requests .
➜➜ Centralized Solution: Another major IT benefit of Media Shuttle is that it enables organizations to consolidate all their file transfers within a singe solution; all transfer activity and users can be monitored, managed and controlled from a single place . Centralizing on Media Shuttle radically reduces technological sprawl within the enterprise, and eliminates all the associated support and control issues that result from alternative file transfer solutions such as FTP or OFS/EFSS .
➜➜ FTP Augmentation: Many organizations rely heavily on FTP, and have dedicated resources to implementing FTP servers for sharing content . Media Shuttle can be installed alongside an existing FTP system and can share the same folders and file systems . By adding these storage locations during installation, users can gain the power and simple interfaces of Media Shuttle, and managers can gain enhanced visibility and insight into their data transfer activity, all without the need to migrate content or change existing content workflows .
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Multi-layered Security — Defense in Depth
Building on the core Transport Layer Security (TLS) built into
the Signiant transfer protocol, Media Shuttle contains a variety
of security features that adhere to the information assurance
principle of “defense in depth” . A defense-in-depth design strategy
incorporates several security controls for a system so that multiple
security failures must occur before an attacker can gain access
to critical resources . Two key components of this strategy are
the principles of “least privilege” and “secure by default” . Least
privilege works on the basis that every task in the system should be
performed with the least privileges possible both in terms of scope
of resources and duration of time that resources can be accessed .
A corollary of least privilege is that mechanisms used to control
access to resources should never be shared . A system is secure by
default when the default settings put the system in a secure state,
ensuring that overt action must be taken to disable security features .
Using these basic principles, Media Shuttle has been designed with
five key security features:
➜➜ Storage Control: The first Media Shuttle security element is provided by the hybrid SaaS nature of Media Shuttle: customers can store their files on-premises or in the cloud, while the software that orchestrates the file movement is a true cloud-native SaaS offering . The content storage itself is always under the customer’s control . This eliminates the security risk of popular consumer online file sharing services, since customer files are never stored in the same file system or cloud storage tenancy as other people’s files . The advantages of segregated storage are numerous, but from a security perspective it provides an extra layer of containerization .
➜➜ Secure Cloud Communications: The second key security feature begins with the creation of a customer account and assignment of top-level administrators for the account . The next step is to set up and associate file transfer servers with the account . Each transfer server installation securely binds with the cloud tier and the customer account using a one-time setup key generated by the cloud tier for this purpose . This one-time key is used to securely establish and exchange security credentials, which are then used to validate and encrypt all future communication between the cloud and the transfer server .
➜➜ Storage Configuration: Once transfer servers are registered with an account, the administrator can create new portals that allow communities of users to securely exchange files . Each portal is associated with a specific area of storage visible to a transfer server or visible to a set of redundant transfer servers . ‘Share’ portals are configured so that portal users can browse the associated storage . With ‘Send’ portals, users have no storage visibility and only utilize the associated storage as a transient cache during a transfer . ‘Share’ portals also obscure the single defined storage location from the users . This ability to assign and manage specific storage locations for each portal adds a third element of security .
➜➜ Secure User Credentials & Web Communications: User interactions with the Media Shuttle system are also highly secure . When users log in to a portal using their username and password, all web interactions utilize standard TLS to authenticate the server and encrypt information exchanged between the browser and the server . For users managed exclusively in Media Shuttle, passwords are stored using secure salted one-way hashes . Passwords are not stored in clear text and what is stored can only be used to determine if a password provided by a user is correct . Passwords provided by users are tested by applying a hashing process and comparing the result to the stored value . The salt is random data that is included in the hash to prevent brute force dictionary attacks on the password database in the unlikely event of a breach .
➜➜ File Transfer Controls. A final element of security derives from Shuttle’s file transfer mechanics . When a user initiates a file transfer via the cloud-served web interface, or a transfer is initiated by an unattended sync operation, transfer instructions must be generated for, and delivered to, the transfer client . These transfer instructions include a unique transfer security token and are delivered via secure web communications . The transfer client then connects to the transfer server and delivers the transfer instructions . The transfer server validates the transfer instructions by contacting the Signiant control plane SaaS with the transfer instructions including the transfer token . This round trip check ensures that transfers are authorized and valid at the time of transfer and are fully tracked by the Signiant SaaS .
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
The performance of Signiant products is based on years of accumulated knowledge about how networks perform in all kinds of real-life scenarios . The company’s R&D efforts have yielded fundamental innovations in solving the problems associated with long-distance file transfer . Signiant holds four patents related to transport technology, with two additional patents (and one pending) relating to architectural innovations in the cloud .
TELEVISION PROGRAMS | USE CASE SNAPSHOT
Media and Entertainment companies use Media Shuttle to receive TV programs from content producers and send them to distribution partners around the world.
12 | MEDIA SHUTTLE PRODUCT WHITE PAPER | WWW.SIGNIANT.COM
MEDIA SHUTTLE IN ACTION — THE OPERATIONAL PERSPECTIVEFor most medium-sized and large organizations, operational staff
fall into two basic role categories: managers and true end-users .
Media Shuttle provides easy to use, intuitive interfaces that support
the key tasks and responsibilities for both roles .
For managers, the Administration interface (also referred to as the
Ops/Admin interface) is the primary means of interacting with Media
Shuttle . Here managers can not only view all the transfer and user
activity for the portals for which IT delegated them administration
rights, but also perform other useful tasks . They can add and delete
users (for example as project teams change over time), define user
rights for folders, and set up email notification rules for content
uploads, downloads and transfer failures . Additionally, once IT has
created a portal and defined it as a Send, Submit or Share site,
managers can, with just a few clicks, brand and customize the
portal by defining logos, backgrounds, color schemes, language
(currently English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, or Portuguese),
and shortcut icon .
For end users, the Media Shuttle experience is simple and
‘consumerized’ . Once they have received the auto-generated
email notification inviting them as a member, end users install the
simple application at the initial prompt and log in with their email
address and password . In a Share portal, the user can select the
file(s) and/or folder(s) they wish to upload/download/view, and click
the appropriate action button . In a Send portal, sending files is
simply a matter of choosing the file(s)/folder(s) to send, adding the
email address(es) of the recipient(s), adding an optional message,
and clicking “Send” . Automatic email notifications allow senders
(and managers, and other interested parties defined by the portal
administrator) to see that the files they sent were successfully
transferred, received, and downloaded . Similarly, recipients receive
email notifications containing a portal link to the file(s), which they
can then view and selectively download to a destination of their
choice . For Submit portals the send process is even simpler; since
no recipients are defined, users just need to select the content
for uploading, optionally add a message, and send . Interested
parties defined for the Submit portal then receive automatic email
notifications that new content has arrived .
In addition to the core advantages of speed, reliability, and security,
Media Shuttle offers a number of other benefits to operational staff:
➜➜ Ease of Use: From an end-user perspective, Media Shuttle portals look and feel much like the standard consumer-grade online file sharing services that most people are now familiar with . The interfaces and tasks they enable are so simple to learn and intuitive to use that zero user training is required . As hands-on personnel come and go within the organization, there is no overhead associated with onboarding them with this essential tool .
From a manager perspective, configuring and branding portals is quick, easy, and intuitive, as is managing user access as project needs and staffing evolve over time . Once portals have been
FIGURE 7 . MEDIA SHUTTLE OPS/ADMIN INTERFACE
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created and delegated by IT, operational managers are able to make the kinds of on-the-fly changes that today’s fast-paced organizations require .
➜➜ Flexible Workflow Support: Between them, the Send, Submit and Share portals support all standard workflows involving person-initiated file transfer operations . From person-to-person and person-to-people content movements (Send), to aggregating content from diverse sources to a single location (Submit), and supporting dynamic project-based collaboration involving content from multiple sources that is to be shared by multiple users (Share), Media Shuttle provides a solution for easily, reliably, and securely moving large files across any distance .
All three portals enable additional workflow flexibility unique to that type of portal . Authenticated Send portals can be configured to allow authenticated members to send content to non-members without requiring the latter to authenticate prior to download, and to invite non-members to join . These options extend the reach of the portal to the wider supply chain . Submit portals are perfect for situations where aggregated content needs downstream processing . By simply pointing a workflow automation engine (such as that provided by Signiant’s Manager+Agents on-premises solution) at a Submit folder, newly arriving content can be automatically processed as it arrives through the portal . Share portals enable not only collaborative access to content added via Media Shuttle, but also shared access to any content placed on the share location by any other transfer mechanism, such as FTP .
The Media Shuttle iOS app extends this flexible workflow support to remote users working in time-sensitive situations out in the field . With the Media Shuttle iOS app, users working on tasks such as covering live events or breaking news can send content to Submit portals directly from their iPhone or iPad with the full power of the core underlying transport technology .
➜➜ Unlimited Portals: Since all Media Shuttle portals are hosted by Signiant in the cloud, there is no practical limit to the number of portals that can be created and supported, always with the same global performance, security, reliability and responsiveness . Signiant extends this capability out to customers by allowing them to create as many individually branded portals as they like, at no additional cost . So whether the customer is a global organization spread across multiple discrete locations, a major content aggregator or content processor with multiple clients or partners, or a single entity conducting multiple distinct projects in parallel, Media Shuttle enables the provisioning of as many portals as are required for as long as they are needed . In situations where end-users are enrolled as members of multiple portals, they just choose which portal they wish to enter at login .
MEDIA SHUTTLE ECONOMICS — THE BUSINESS PERSPECTIVEFor the business process owner concerned with budgets and
expenditures, Media Shuttle offers particular advantages not found
with competing solutions . The SaaS model has intrinsic advantages
that are well aligned with the realities of today’s dynamic
business world, and Signiant has developed a unique pricing
model to further accommodate customer needs . The following
considerations will be of interest to business stakeholders:
➜➜ Lowest Total Cost of Ownership (TCO): Media Shuttle is sold as an annual subscription, thereby requiring much less upfront CAPEX than purchase of perpetual license software . Savvy customers realize that this also means they can adopt a “buy it to try it” approach . Rather than undertaking the costly and time-consuming analysis that major capital investments demand, they simply buy a subscription, deploy it, and see if it adds value . As a hybrid SaaS solution, Media Shuttle also provides customers with a significant reduction in ongoing software maintenance costs . The time and energy that IT staff must spend to upgrade and maintain on-premises software can be hard to quantify, but it is very real . This combination of SaaS-related economic benefits ensures that customers are purchasing an industrial-strength file movement solution with the lowest possible total cost of ownership .
➜➜ Pricing Based on Active Users: Pricing for standard hybrid SaaS Media Shuttle deployments is based solely on the number of active users . An active user is defined as any person (defined by email address) who sends at least one file, or receives three or more files, in a given month . Customer costs are independent of bandwidth, file size, total amount of files transferred, number of portals provided or locations supported, or any other variable . (As discussed on page 17, cloud storage deployments can incur overages for high data volumes .)
VIDEO CREATION | USE CASE SNAPSHOT
Creative collaborators use Media Shuttle to move video content around the world for editing, special effects, and localization.
14 | MEDIA SHUTTLE PRODUCT WHITE PAPER | WWW.SIGNIANT.COM
It is important to note that different people can consume the active user subscription every month . Unlike a ‘named user’ model where each person who uses the service needs an annual subscription, this floating license model is optimized for dynamic business environments . Customers typically have many people, both inside and outside their companies, enrolled as members of their portals — and there is no incremental charge as long as the number of people actively using the system during the billing period is within the subscription user count .
This unique pricing model allows for significant organizational flexibility in how customers use the system . Whether it is the same users every month throughout the duration of the subscription, or the active users change every month, is completely in the customer’s hands . Since there is no charge for adding inactive members, Media Shuttle allows for advanced planning and increased business agility — inactive members can become active users simply by using the system . Moreover, unlike solutions that price based on bandwidth utilization, the floating license model ensures that users will never find their transfers slowed down simply because they have exceeded their plan’s bandwidth allowance . Recognizing that it is not always easy at the outset to predict actual usage needs, Signiant will work with customers in the first year to find the subscription tier most appropriate for that organization .
➜➜ Tiered Pricing: Media Shuttle licenses are sold in annual subscription blocks of users priced and packaged as tiers (with ten users the base tier) . The higher the tier licensed (and hence the number of users), the lower the price per user . Customers select the tier most appropriate for their organization and thereby fix their annual OPEX for the solution . In the event that
actual usage exceeds the tier purchased, customers can switch to a higher tier, and gain the lower rates, at any time during the contract . Additionally, periods of unusually high demand for the solution require no action on the client side . The additional usage will simply be added and charged on the next billing cycle at the current rate for the tier purchased, thereby enabling seamless scaling for the customer .
➜➜ Monthly Statements: As a SaaS, all Media Shuttle file and user activity is managed and tracked on the Signiant-administered control layer in the cloud . Billing is automated based on this activity and sent to the client as a monthly statement detailing the number of licenses purchased, the active users in that month, and any billable overage for the period . The billing statement makes it easy for customers to analyze on a month-to-month basis the number of active users, and determine whether or not they need to change their subscription tier .
ACTIVE USERS FLOATING LICENSE
➜➜ All 25 people are members of portals
➜➜ Customers pay only for 15 active users;
may be different people each month
➜➜ An active user is someone who sends
at least one file or receives three or
more files in a given month
➜➜ No charge and no limits on members
MONTH 1
MONTH 2
ARCHITECTURAL DRAWING | USE CASE SNAPSHOT
Architects and designers use Media Shuttle to exchange drawings for collaboration, bid processes, and construction.
15 | MEDIA SHUTTLE PRODUCT WHITE PAPER | WWW.SIGNIANT.COM
Additional Media Shuttle Options — More Power, More Flexibility, More CloudFor organizations with more advanced needs, or requiring features
and capabilities beyond the standard Media Shuttle version,
Signiant offers several variations .
MEDIA SHUTTLE ENTERPRISESigniant offers an Enterprise version of Media Shuttle that adds
features typically of interest to larger companies:
➜➜ Auto Delivery: As Media Shuttle is rolled out across the enterprise, use cases often emerge for unattended delivery . It may be possible to gain efficiencies by eliminating the need to manually check for new content, or by streamlining distribution of the same content to multiple partners . The Auto Delivery feature provides this capability via the native Signiant App running on the end user’s computer, along with a means of configuring folders for automatic upload or download . This feature of Share portals is especially useful in situations where there is a time zone difference between transfer end-points, where content is ingested from multiple locations, or where the same content needs to be distributed to multiple locations .
➜➜ Metadata Collection: This feature allows end users to populate predefined fields with information describing the file they are about to send . The experience is fully customizable, offering system administrators the ability to define fields for any parameter — often things such as file size, language or shooting location — to ensure that all of the necessary information is captured . The metadata remains associated with the file, making it easy for a person or process to take action upon receipt . For example, someone in the media library can archive the file in an appropriate category, or an automated workflow can send it to a particular distribution partner . This capability is implemented via customer-hosted web pages, which enables customers to tie file submissions to existing form-based workflows and metadata policies . Metadata is stored in JSON files that accompany, and are linked to, the associated content . This feature is very useful for automating downstream processing in cases where the content was not submitted with an equivalent sidecar file (such as an XML), and also supports requested file deliveries with pre-filled metadata .
➜➜ Single Sign On (SSO) with SAML: Media Shuttle includes advanced identity management so that enterprises can easily and securely onboard and manage large numbers of users . Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) allows system administrators to engage a third-party Web identity provider to grant users access to multiple systems . This contemporary approach to enabling the use of a corporate directory for user authentication has benefits for both administrators and end users . Administrators can easily provision large user groups, and individual employees can simply log into Media Shuttle with their corporate account credentials .
The fact that passwords are not stored in the cloud by Signiant adds one more level of protection for the customer’s high-value digital assets . When web SSO is used, user passwords are never exposed to Media Shuttle web servers . Instead, Media Shuttle utilizes a trust relationship to interact with identity gateways, like the Active Directory Federated Services gateway, to securely retrieve and validate access tokens for users . With SAML auto-registration, users are automatically added as members of the portal with full permissions upon successful SAML authentication . This method reduces the administrative overhead associated with adding new members to portals .
➜➜ CloudSpeX: CloudSpeX is Signiant’s patent-pending technology for “pre-flight” file format validation . CloudSpeX automatically extracts metadata from a file to be sent and compares the metadata against a cloud-based delivery specification . If the metadata indicates that the file is compliant with the spec, the transfer proceeds; if it is not compliant the transfer is stopped and the administrator is notified . This capability is focused on video assets, with metadata parameters typically relating to file type and/or encoding parameters . By forcing compliance with a defined standard prior to transferring files, Media Shuttle can ensure that valuable time and resources are not spent transferring bad assets and dealing with them at the receiving end . This pre-validation saves time, helps manage the volume and complexity of today’s multiplatform media ecosystems, and ensures greater network efficiency .
Signiant maintains a library of standard delivery specifications, and customers can optionally define their own . To set up CloudSpeX, Media Shuttle portal administrators simply associate a specific delivery specification template with a portal . A single portal can be configured with multiple CloudSpeX specifications, providing for even greater flexibility . CloudSpeX ‘Interested Party’ email notifications can be configured to allow for broader distribution of detailed delivery compliance failures .
FIGURE 8 . METADATA COLLECTION FORM
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The CloudSpeX functionality is another example of how innovative
use of the cloud can benefit Signiant’s customers . Because
CloudSpeX is delivered via the cloud, this capability can be
accessed from anywhere in the world, by every partner in the supply
chain . Updates to the delivery specification are immediately available
to everyone, with each partner automatically compelled to deal
with the most recent version .
MEDIA SHUTTLE WITH CLOUD OBJECT STORAGESigniant’s newest Media Shuttle option allows customers to use
their cloud object storage tenancy in Amazon S3 and/or Microsoft
Azure Blob storage in a Media Shuttle deployment . There are
several reasons this might be of interest:
➜➜ The customer may be undertaking a large-scale migration to the cloud and therefore desire object storage compatibility for all storage-intensive applications .
➜➜ There may be interest in taking advantage of the elasticity of the cloud for a specific Media Shuttle project, such as file movement for a major event . ‘Renting’ cloud storage rather than buying on-premises storage might be a far more cost-effective option .
➜➜ A cloud-storage-centric use case might also be the driver . Without Media Shuttle, there is really no way for end users to easily and intuitively move content into and out of cloud storage .
➜➜ The customer may want a solution that is even easier to deploy than standard Media Shuttle . As described below, an object storage deployment of Shuttle takes Signiant’s cloud-formed SaaS strategy one step further and eliminates even more burden on the IT department .
This version of Media Shuttle borrows features and capabilities
from Signiant’s other SaaS product, Flight, a utility designed for
bulk upload/downloads of large files to/from cloud object storage .
Specifically, it implements both the control plane and the data
plane as true, cloud-formed, multi-tenancy SaaS solutions . With
an object storage Media Shuttle deployment the Signiant SaaS
control layer continues to provide control functions, but now the
data layer is also in the cloud, where auto-scaling, redundant and
load balanced file transfer servers are hosted and maintained by
Signiant and connected to the customer’s cloud object storage
tenancy . The system architecture is illustrated Figure 9 .
This multi-tenant, auto-scaling, SaaS implementation frees the
customer from the need to buy, deploy and manage their own
storage, servers and software, thereby reducing even further
both the initial CAPEX investment and the IT staff’s workload .
Customers are free to use more than one cloud storage provider,
or to continue with their standard on-premises deployment, or
to mix both on-premises and cloud object storage portals within
a single Media Shuttle deployment .
It is important to note that some Media Shuttle customers have
always chosen to deploy their systems in the cloud . However,
this was previously accomplished by the customer installing and
managing the file transfer server software on virtual machines that
they themselves purchased from the cloud platform vendor . Like
any other “cloud-washed” approach, this method leaves the system
administration and maintenance responsibility for the data plane
with the client, and fails to truly leverage the scalability, elasticity,
resilience, or performance of a true multi-tenancy SaaS solution .
CLOUD
CLOUD
AND/OR
• WEB INTERFACE • EMAIL NOTIFICATIONS• CLIENT UPDATES• FILE TRANSFER LOGISTICS• DATA COLLECTION
CUSTOMER’S CLOUD OBJECT
STORAGE TENANCY
END USERS’ LAPTOPS/ DESKTOPS
WITH SIGNIANT APP INSTALLED
INTERNET (OR CUSTOMER NETWORK)
FIGURE 9 . MEDIA SHUTTLE WITH CLOUD OBJECT STORAGE
END USEREND USEROPS/ADMINIT
SIGNIANT DATA LAYER SAAS
AUTOSCALING CLOUD SERVERS & SOFTWARE MANAGED BY SIGNIANT
SIGNIANT CONTROLLAYER SAAS
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Lacking a true data plane integration to the provider’s cloud storage,
such deployments further restrict the customer to only being able
to utilize the cloud provider’s more expensive block storage, and
not their cheaper, more scalable, object storage, which is generally
more optimal for storing large amounts of unstructured data .
Customer deployments of standard Media Shuttle in the cloud
therefore do enjoy the benefits deriving from the SaaS nature
of Media Shuttle’s control plane, but not the advantages of a
cloud-formed data plane SaaS .
Media Shuttle with cloud object storage is priced and packaged
with the same tiered subscription model as standard Media Shuttle .
Customers choose a tier based on the number of active users in a
given month, with price per user declining as the number of users
increases . Each user tier now also includes, at no extra charge, a
baseline volume of content that can be moved to/from the cloud
each month . “Pay-as-you-go” overage prices are specified for
both users and payload for each tier .
Customers looking to deploying Media Shuttle for “hands-on” file
movement to object storage in the cloud may also have a parallel
use case for more automated bulk upload/download capabilities
to/from the same cloud storage tenancy . Signiant recommends
that they consider adding Flight to their technology ecosystem to
meet this need . Flight is a simple utility that can be controlled via a
CLI (Command Line Interface); or connected directly into a Signiant
Manager+Agents installation via a pre-built workflow component .
WEB TRANSFER API FOR EMBEDDED APPLICATIONSWhile most customers need the full Media Shuttle solution, some
enterprises have already invested in building their own web
applications — and may want to add speed, security, and reliability
to the underlying file movement . For example, media services
providers or large enterprises with in-house web developers may
have built custom content submission portals with very specific
features for metadata creation, search, etc . For these situations,
Signiant offers a JavaScript API that allows customers’ web
developers to embed Signiant file transfer acceleration directly into
their own in-house web applications .
This offering is known as the Signiant Web Transfer API . Signiant’s
SaaS products employ a modular architecture and this is the same
API that Media Shuttle is built upon — so many attributes are the
same . As with the full Media Shuttle application, API customers can
choose between on-premises storage and cloud object storage in
the data plane . In both cases, the API now replaces the Signiant file
transfer software on the client side, and server implementation is
as follows:
➜➜ If the customer chooses to deploy on-premises storage, an on-premises server running Signiant software is also required .
➜➜ If the customer prefers to use their cloud object storage tenancy, the server-side compute resources and software are provided by Signiant as a fully managed, elastic SaaS in Amazon S3 and/or Microsoft Azure .
➜➜ On the control plane, file transfer software updates and file transfer activity tracking are still managed by the Signiant SaaS in the cloud, but all the end user interfaces are built and hosted by the customer . The pricing model for the Web Transfer API is based on payload — i .e . the cumulative volume of data moved during the annual subscription period . As with standard Media Shuttle, the file transfer server software is provided at no cost .
CAD FILES | USE CASE SNAPSHOT
Product designers use Media Shuttle to collaborate on detailed drawings and communicate details to fabricators.
MEDICAL IMAGES | USE CASE SNAPSHOT
Healthcare professionals use Media Shuttle to share medical images for diagnosis and treat-ment collaboration.
18 | MEDIA SHUTTLE PRODUCT WHITE PAPER | WWW.SIGNIANT.COM
Media Shuttle was introduced in 2012 and has since become the
de facto tool for fast, reliable sending and sharing of files . Because it
can be used to send files of any type and size, across any network,
over any distance, Media Shuttle has applications across many
industry sectors — and it is useful for any organization, big or
small, that has such requirements . Able to scale from the smallest
boutique operation or start-up, with ten or less users, to the largest
global enterprise with thousands of users, Media Shuttle’s “pay
only for what you use” pricing accommodates customers of all
sizes . Because of its multi-tenancy SaaS nature, all customers,
irrespective of size, receive the same core service, performance,
reliability, and security . When the solution is upgraded to the
Enterprise tier, all of the incremental features are immediately
available to all users .
Optimized for sending and sharing large files, Media Shuttle is
particularly useful for organizations with video-centric workflows .
Video files are large, there are generally short timelines involved,
and video assets often involve multiple creative processes that
result in a geographically distributed supply chain . Historically
these use cases were largely restricted to the major Media &
Entertainment (M&E) companies such as film studios, post-
production and production companies, special effects houses,
TV news and sports divisions, and broadcast and cable networks .
But in today’s world, the sending and sharing of large video files
extends to many other areas outside traditional M&E . Video is
the communication medium of choice in every corner of today’s
business world, making Media Shuttle an essential tool for
advertising agencies, corporate communications and marketing
departments, online and mobile video download and streaming
platforms, religious organizations, sports teams and leagues, and
many more .
Furthermore, the need to send and share large digital files across
geographically distributed locations, or to and from cloud storage,
is no longer the privileged domain of video-centric operations .
Areas as diverse as life and earth sciences, the pharmaceutical and
chemical industries, energy exploration, product design, software
development, and big data analytics, all increasingly work with very
large files and require the same kinds of capabilities and tools for
moving them .
Media Shuttle is the right solution for addressing the proliferation
of “hands-on” file movement use cases across all these, and
countless other, traditional and emerging sectors of data-centric
human activity .
This is what the 100,000 global users of Media Shuttle know.
Who Should Use Media Shuttle?
ABOUT SIGNIANT
Signiant’s intelligent file movement software helps enterprises ensure fast, secure, and reliable delivery of large data sets over public and private IP networks . Built on Signiant’s patented technology, the company’s on-premises software and SaaS solutions move petabytes of high-value data every day between users, applications and systems with proven ease .
Signiant is a venture-backed company based in Boston, Massachusetts, with development teams in Ottawa Canada and sales offices around the world .
SEISMIC DATA | USE CASE SNAPSHOT
Earth scientists use Media Shuttle to send large seismic data sets used for fundamental research as well as gas and oil exploration.