Planning your network topology

Where to place your HCL Traveler server in your network depends on the types of devices used and sync types. This section includes a list of possible scenarios and why one might be selected over another.

HCL Verse and HCL Traveler for Microsoft Outlook clients

The HCL Verse clients running on Apple and Android devices and HCL Traveler for Microsoft Outlook (HTMO) use a single communication channel for data syncing. The data sync channel uses HTTP or HTTPS to communicate with the server. This channel is always initiated from the mobile device. You should secure the channel either through a Virtual Private Network (VPN) or by using HTTPS so that all data sent is encrypted.

All clients support Push notifications through the HTTP or HTTPS data sync channel or via a third party (Verse Android and Verse iOS). Verse Android clients support push notifications via Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM) and Verse iOS clients via Apple Push Notification service (APNs). FCM or APNS notifications are received by the HCL Verse client which then initiates a data sync request over HTTP or HTTPS.

Other devices

Supported third-party clients that use the Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync protocol, for example Apple iOS mail clients, use either HTTP or HTTPS communication channels to sync with the Traveler server. These clients initiate a long running HTTP or HTTPs connection (Push request) to be notified of server changes. Whenever a request returns with results indicating server changes, the client initiates a data sync request.

Connection types and ports

The following table provides a summary of the connection types used by the mobile devices and the ports they use by default. Only one data sync channel is used but the mobile devices can support either HTTP or HTTPS.

Table 1. Connection types and default port numbers
Used for Connection type Default port Notes

Data syncing

HTTPS

443

This connection type is best for data syncing. The port uses a secure channel for data transfer between the device and the server.

Data syncing

HTTP

80

The port uses an unsecured channel for data transfer between the device and the server.

These topics describe different network topologies and give more specific information about why each might be used:

Server types and ports

The following table provides a summary of the connection types used by the HCL Traveler Server and the ports used by default.
Table 2. Server ports
Used for Connection type Default port Notes
Inter-process communication   TCP 50125 Port used for servlet to server task communication as well as server task to server task communication (HA pool). Secure socket (SSL) is used if configured.  
Inter-process communication   TCP 50126 Port used for server task to servlet communication. Secure socket (SSL) is used if configured.
Database communication TCP 50000 (DB2®) 1433 (MS SQL) 3306 (MySQL) 3306(MariaDB) 5432(PostgreSQL) Database server port used for server task to database server jdbc communication. The port for the DB2 Database instance can vary based on the number of instances on the database server. Port 1433 for the SQL Server communication is standard. Port 3306 is standard for MySQL and MariaDB. Port 5432 is standard for PostgreSQL.
Mail server communication RPC/TCP 1352 Port used by the HCL Traveler server to communicate with each mail server.
Clock Accuracy NTP 123 Port used by the HCL Traveler server to communicate with a Network Transport Protocol (NTP) server to check the local system clock's accuracy. This check is optional but enabled by default and can be disabled via NTS_NTP_SERVER or NTS_NTP_PORT notes.ini settings. For more information, Notes.ini settings.

Third-party push types, servers and ports

The following table provides a summary of the push connection types used by the HCL Traveler Server to send messages to the devices via third-party services and the servers and ports used by default. If you are using a proxy, Traveler will send the messages to the proxy and the proxy will need to be able to access these servers and ports.
Table 3. Third-party push types, servers and ports
Used for Connection type Default server(s) Default port Notes
Verse Android FCM oauth2.googleapis.com

fcm.googleapis.com		 443 oauth2.googleapis.com is used for obtaining the authorization token which is then included on the requests to fcm.googleapis.com to send the messages to the devices. For more information on FCM, see the Firebase Cloud Messaging reference provided by Google.
Verse iOS APNS api.push.apple.com 443 For more information on APNS, see Communicating with APNs in the Apple documentation.

For related information and notes.ini settings, see the NTS_PUSH* settings in Notes.ini settings and Push messaging through a proxy.

Network interfaces

During initialization, the HCL Traveler server automatically scans the available network interfaces and uses the first active, non-loopback option. In most cases, this automatic selection will be adequate. If the server has multiple network interfaces, however, the wrong interface may be selected during initialization. If this happens, the notes.ini setting named NTS_HOST_IP_ADDR can be used to manually select the correct interface. See Notes.ini settings for more details about configuring the interface and port settings.