Explanation

What the Console does, and what it never sees

Mirall moves files directly between the computers that need them. The Console sits beside that, not in the middle of it: it issues license keys, holds the configuration each computer should have, and shows what each computer reports about itself.

So the Console holds your organization's keys, profiles, members and audit log, and the reports computers send. It never holds your files, your spaces, or who shares with whom; none of that passes through it.

Mirall keeps the configuration it has received and keeps it current over the peer-to-peer network, asking our servers only while no peer has it. If the Console is unreachable, every computer goes on working with the configuration it already has. The same holds if your organization is ever suspended: the Console closes, and Mirall keeps working on every machine.

Keys, seats and computers

A license key belongs to one person, not to a computer. Someone with a laptop and an edit-suite workstation uses one key on both, and both receive the profile the key carries. The key is what you move, suspend or revoke when that person's situation changes.

Each person with an active key takes one seat, however many computers they use. The seat count is a signal for you and for us, never a lock: going over your plan shows on License keys, and no transfer ever stops because of a license.

Because a key is the credential that connects a computer to your organization, the Console treats it like one. The full key is shown once when it is issued. After that, each reveal is recorded with the name of whoever revealed it, and it hides itself again after 30 seconds.

Revoking a key ends it: it stops receiving configuration, frees its seat, and retires its computers. What it cannot do is reach back into a computer. Settings that computer already applied stay applied, and anything already shared with it stays shared.

Profiles, templates and locks

A profile is a set of settings for a group of people, and each key carries one. A template is a baseline several profiles share: a profile based on one inherits its settings, adds its own, and can't undo what the template locks.

Setting a value is the same as locking it. A computer applies the settings its organization locks and shows each as Set by <organization>; everything else stays the person's own choice. That keeps the line clear for the person at the computer: a setting is either theirs or yours, never a default you might quietly change later.

Some settings are security controls, such as recording activity or requiring a backup. These can only be tightened from the Console, never relaxed, so a mistaken profile can't switch a safeguard off. Others are policies, such as the relay or how long activity is kept: the app honours them, but nothing enforces them cryptographically, and the Console labels them so.

Everything a person sets for their own comfort — bandwidth, startup, notifications, theme — is deliberately not something the Console can manage.

Saving, publishing and versions

A profile has one draft. Save keeps your changes to it; nothing reaches a computer until you Publish. That lets you prepare a change, have someone check it, and send it when it suits you.

Each publish creates the profile's next version and delivers it to every computer on the profile within minutes. Versions are never edited after the fact. Going back means restoring an old version into the draft and publishing it again, so the history always shows what each computer was sent, and when.

Your organization's name and support contacts travel with every version, which is why changing them on Organization redelivers your published profiles. A template has no separate publish: profiles pick up a changed template the next time they are published.

What computers report, and why nothing is enforced

A connected computer reports its name, its Mirall version and operating system, which of your configuration it has applied and anything it could not apply, and whether its backup is set up and working. It reports when it starts, when its configuration changes, once a day, and when it leaves.

Instances shows those reports as they are. A computer behind on its configuration, or with a backup at risk, is something to follow up on: the Console never blocks a computer, a person or a transfer because of a report. The privacy policy sets out exactly what a report holds, in section 8.

Your studio's relay

Most connections between Mirall computers are direct. Behind strict firewalls, some can't be, and a relay carries them instead. A Mirall relay is blind: it forwards encrypted data and can't read what it carries.

For a studio, the relay runs on your side, on your own server or in your cloud account. We set it up with you as part of the rollout, because where it should run depends on your network. After that the Console hands its key to every install, so nobody at a computer has to configure anything.

Whether a computer uses it is a setting of its profile: off, only when a direct connection fails, or always, which also hides each computer's address from its peers. More about the Mirall for Studios relay is on the relay page.