Receiving Files with HTTP

When you receive files sent via HTTP, you cannot observe the file transfer(s) on the server but you can see summary information about the transfers in the Log window of the MassTransit Administrator application. In addition, you can designate services and/or actions that you have configured on the server, to be performed on the received files in the Files window of the MassTransit Administrator application.

Please note that using a secured connection may slow down the transmission speed. When you encrypt the files, the file transfers are more secure but that increases the time for the transmission.

The transferred files are being received in the Received folder of the contact's mailbox.

MassTransit Unicode Support

MassTransit 6.0.2 and later support transfers of files and folders with Unicode characters in TCP/IP, TCP/IP Secure, and UDT file transfers. By default, MassTransit will queue and transfer files and folders with high Unicode (>0xFF) successfully across the MassTransit protocol (TCP/IP, TCP/IP Secure, and UDT connections).

See the Transferring Files page for more information on the MassTransit Unicode support.

Ad Hoc Delivery

Ad hoc file transfer allows Web client contacts to send files to users designated by email addresses that may or may not already have accounts in MassTransit. After logging in to the MassTransit Web (MTWeb) site, Web client users are allowed to send files to any valid email address. When the Web client clicks on the "Send" button, the files are sent to the MassTransit server. If the entered email address does not belong to an existing contact on the server, an account with that address is automatically created. If you have a limited Web client contact licenses, the automatically created contact will be an Ad hoc contact. Otherwise, the created contact will be a Web client contact.

See the Ad Hoc Delivery page for more information and configuration instructions.

Request Files

MassTransit 7 provides a new feature called Request Files. It allows Web client users to request files to be sent to them from other users designated by email addresses. After logging in to the MassTransit Web (MTWeb) site, the web client users are allowed to send a request to any valid email address. If the entered email address does not belong to an existing contact on the server, an account with that address is automatically created.

See the Request Files page for more information and configuration instructions.

Configuring Request Files

The configuration of the Request Files feature consists of three principal steps:

• Configure the Ad hoc delivery feature;
• Creating an email action in MassTransit to notify the users that there is a request for files;
• Configuring the desired individual Web client contacts that will be able to request files from existing contacts and arbitrary email addresses.

Configuring the Ad Hoc Delivery Feature

Before configuring the request files feature, you need to configure the ad hoc delivery feature first. You can find detailed instructions about how to do that on the Ad Hoc Delivery page.

If you have already configured the ad hoc delivery feature, continue with the instructions below.

Creating an Email Action

To enable the Request Files feature, you need to add an email action in MassTransit which will notify the contacts of the file request.

1. Open the MassTransit Administrator application.
2. Open the Setup window by clicking on the Setup button from the Navigation Bar or by selecting the Setup... option from the Window main menu.
3. In the Actions tab of the Setup window, click on the Add… button.
4. Enter a name for the action in the Name field (e.g., "Request files notification email").
5. Select the Files Requested option from the When drop-down menu.
6. Click on the Configure Email Action button from the Tasks area (the first button on the left side of the window).
7. Make the following changes in the Configure Email Action window:
   1. Leave the To field empty. If you want a copy of every Files Requested email to be sent to a specific address, you can enter the address in the To field.
   2. Check the Include Contact Email Address When Available check box.
   3. Enter a subject for the notification e-mails in the Subject field or enter the following token to use the subject that is entered in MTWeb when making the file request:

   $${{Subject}}

   1. Enter text for the email notification in the Message field. You can set email links which can take the contact to the MassTransit Web (MTWeb) with the contact’s user name already populated. If the link also contains a passkey, the contact is automatically logged in to the MTWeb site without having to know his user name and password.

   The token that will contain an HTTP link, allowing the contact to click the link and send files from the MassTransit server is:

   $${{HTTPLink_passkey}}

   The following 3 tokens are also available with the Files Requested action:

   • $${{Subject}} - displays the text entered by the sender in the "Subject" field of the "Request Files" page in MTWeb.
   • $${{Note}} - displays the text entered by the sender in the "Body" field of the "Request Files" page in MTWeb.
   • $${{Message}} - this token should be used instead of the $${{Note}} token for MassTransit versions 7.1 or later. Displays the text entered by the sender in the "Body" field of the "Request Files" page in MTWeb.

   Here is an example text for the email action Message area:

   $${{ContactName}},

   $${{OriginatingContactName}} ($${{OriginatingEmailAddress}}) is requesting files from you:

   $${{Subject}}

   $${{Note}}

   Click the link below to be automatically logged in and to send files.

   $${{HTTPLink_passkey}}

   This automatic login link is good for $${{PasskeyTTLHours}} hours.

   The used tokens in the example text of the e-mail notification do the following:

   $${{ContactName}} - name of the person receiving the email

   $${{OriginatingContactName}} - displays the contact name of the originating user who is requesting the files

   $${{OriginatingEmailAddress}} - displays the email address of the originating user

   $${{PasskeyTTLHours}} - displays the validity time of the passkey link set in the MassTransitEngine.cfg file

   Note: The complete list with the available tokens and detailed information about them can be found on the Email Notification Tokens page.

Configuring Contacts to Use Request Files

The last step for configuring the request files feature is to set the desired individual users who will be able to send files to other contacts and arbitrary e-mail addresses. This configuration is per user only and you need to set it for each Web client contact that you want to use the feature. To do this, edit an existing Web client contact or add a new one from the Contacts window of the MassTransit Administrator.

1. To edit an existing Web client contact, highlight it in the Contacts window of the MassTransit Administrator and click on the Edit... button.
2. In the Contact Information window that appears, open the Security tab.
3. Check the Allow Sending Files To Arbitrary Email Addresses check box in the Web Privileges section.

   Note: For more information about contact privileges, see Contact Privileges on the Contacts page.

4. Click OK in the Contact Information window to save the changes.

Now, the request files feature is fully configured and the chosen Web client contacts should be able to send file requests to arbitrary email addresses.

Using the Request Files Feature

The request files feature can be used by Web client contacts only. They can find detailed information on how to send requests for files on the Requesting Files page from the Web Client User Guide.

Web Client Users Repeatedly Prompted to "Enter Network Password"

MassTransit web users may be repeatedly prompted to Enter Network Password when attempting to access a MassTransit file transfer website hosted by Microsoft IIS. This dialog may appear prior to the display of any MassTransit web content, and may repeatedly appear throughout the user’s MassTransit web session.

Users attempting to access a MassTransit file transfer website hosted on Microsoft IIS may be prompted with a Windows authentication dialog if the MassTransit website permissions have not been configured to allow Anonymous access. As a result, a dialog box asking "Enter Network Password" may appear throughout the web session.

To resolve this behavior, Microsoft IIS must be configured to allow Anonymous access.

Follow the steps below for enabling Anonymous access on IIS depending on the IIS version you have.

Enabling Anonymous Access on IIS 6

To enable Anonymous access on IIS 6:

1. Launch the Internet Information Services (IIS) Management Console from Start → Administrative Tools → IIS Manager.
2. Right-click on the MassTransit website instance and select the Properties option.
3. Open the Directory Security tab on the Web Site Properties window that appears.
4. Click on the Edit... button from the Authentication and access control area.
5. In the Authentication methods window that appears, check the Enable Anonymous Access check box.
6. Click on the Browse... button next to the User name field and select the IUSR_COMPUTERNAME account (this is the Internet Guest User account; COMPUTERNAME is the name of your computer). Then, click OK.
7. The IUSR_COMPUTERNAME account appears in the User name field. Enter the corresponding for the account password in the Password field.
8. Click OK in the Authentication methods window.
9. Click OK again to save the changes and close the web site's properties.
10. Restart IIS.

    Note: The Internet Guest User account begins with "IUSR_" and may also need to be enabled within the Users and Groups Management Console.

The Anonymous access should be enabled and the web client users (Web client and Ad hoc contacts) should not be prompted to Enter Network Password.

Enabling Anonymous Access on IIS 7

To enable Anonymous access on IIS 7:

1. Launch the Internet Information Services (IIS) Management Console from Start → Administrative Tools → IIS Manager.
2. Click on the MassTransit website instance from the Connections pane of the IIS Manager.
3. Double click Authentication from the Home pane.
4. Highlight Anonymous Authentication from the list with authentication methods and click on the Enable option from the Actions pane.
5. Restart IIS.

   Note: The Internet Guest User account begins with "IUSR_" and may also need to be enabled within the Users and Groups Management Console.

The Anonymous access should be enabled and the web client users (Web client and Ad hoc contacts) should not be prompted to Enter Network Password.