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Administering Connections 7.0
Welcome to the HCL Connections documentation site. HCL Connections is social networking software designed for the workplace. Its features help you to establish dynamic networks that connect you to the people and information you need to achieve your business goals.
Planning
Before installing HCL Connections™, study the system requirements, deployment options, and documentation conventions.
HCL Connections™ system requirements
A variety of hardware and software is required to run HCL Connections™.

Administering Connections 7.0
Welcome to the HCL Connections documentation site. HCL Connections is social networking software designed for the workplace. Its features help you to establish dynamic networks that connect you to the people and information you need to achieve your business goals.
- What's new in HCL Connections
  Find out about features that are new or updated in this release of HCL Connections.
- Product overview
  Learn how to deploy, customize, and administer the HCL Connections social networking product.
- Planning
  Before installing HCL Connections™, study the system requirements, deployment options, and documentation conventions.
  - Audience
    This Installation Guide assumes that you have prior experience with products that support enterprise web applications.
  - Directory path conventions
    Directory variables are abbreviations for the default installation paths for IBM® AIX®, Linux™, and Microsoft™ Windows™. This topic defines the directory variable and its matching default installation directory for each supported operating system.
  - Deployment options
    Install HCL Connections™ in one of three deployment topologies to achieve optimum scaling, load balancing, and failover.
  - Allowable characters for user ID and password
    Install HCL Connections™ allows the setting of rules and limitations on the allowable characters for its user ID and password.
  - HCL Connections™ system requirements
    A variety of hardware and software is required to run HCL Connections™.
  - HCL Connections™ support statement
    HCL Software relies on a range of other commercial and non-commercial Third Party Software to perform its function. This document describes the support that customers can expect for various configurations of HCL Connections, other HCL Programs, and Third Party Software.
  - Worksheet for installing HCL Connections™
    Record your installation and configuration data.
- Installing Connections
  To install HCL Connections™, you need to follow a detailed series of procedures.
- Installing or upgrading Component Pack for Connections
  HCL Connections 7.0 now supports the latest Component Pack based in Harbor, an open-source container and Helm registry hosted by HCL for the Component Pack build. Deployments that are new or carrying Component Pack 7 will use this approach for a simplified installation/upgrade process, while releases prior to 7.0 will first need to upgrade to Component Pack 7 using a zip file and a local Docker registry.
- Post-installation tasks
  After installation, you need to perform further tasks to ensure an efficient deployment.
- Optional: Installing and configuring Tiny Editors for HCL Connections
  The Tiny editors are alternative rich-text editors which can be installed for HCL Connections™. They provide additional features and extensive customization options not available with the default editor.
- Optional post-installation tasks
  Complete the post-installation tasks that are relevant to your deployment.
- Uninstalling
  Uninstall HCL Connections.
- Upgrading and updating
  Upgrade HCL Connections and its supporting software to the latest release and then update the installation with the latest interim fixes or cumulative fixes. Refer to the What's New in HCL Connections to review the features in the latest release and gather download links or links to the latest fix list and update strategy information.
- Administering
  Run administration and maintenance tasks to keep your environment up-to-date. For example, learn how to customize your deployment or how to use the wsadmin utility to edit configuration files. You can also schedule tasks, maintain application databases, moderate content, or manage users and their roles.
- Customizing
  Customize HCL Connections™ to fit your environment.
- Security
  HCL Connections™ provides a flexible security infrastructure that supports an open, easily shareable data model.
- Mobile
  See the HCL Connections™ Mobile documentation for Connections Cloud and Connections on-premises.
- Developing
  Get information about how to use the APIs provided with HCL Connections™ and how to use Connections Customizer to modify the Connections pages that are returned to users.
- Troubleshooting and support
  To isolate and resolve problems with your HCL products, you can use the troubleshooting and support information. This information contains instructions for using the problem-determination resources that are provided with your HCL products, including HCL Connections™.

HCL Connections™ system requirements

A variety of hardware and software is required to run HCL Connections™.

System requirements

To view the hardware and software requirements, go to the Detailed system requirements for HCL Connections™.