Looking at the Administration Console

The Administration Console helps you manage the server. Because there's a lot under the hood, I'm not going to dive into it. Instead, assume you have just bought a new car and the neighbors are visiting to check out your new purchase. What do you do? Open the hood (or bonnet, depending on where you live) and start pointing stuff out. Let's show the neighbors what you have.

The first thing that strikes most people new to Flash Media Server is that it isn't an application. Even though you installed the software into the same directory where you keep Flash CS3 Professional and other Adobe products, there is no product icon. The Administration Console is an HTML document. This makes sense because you are dealing with a server, not a stand-alone application.

To open the Administration Console, either locate it on the Start menu or click the All Programs button on your Start menu and navigate to Adobe > Flash Media Server 3.5 > Flash Media Administration Console (see Figure 11).

Figure 11. Locating the Administration Console in the Start menu

Alternatively, navigate to C:\Program Files\Adobe\Flash Media Server 3\tools and double-click the Flash Media Administration Console link (see Figure 12). Be sure to double-click the HTML file shown (fms_adminConsole.htm), not fms_adminConsole.swf, to launch the Administration Console.

Figure 12. Locating the Administration Console in Windows Explorer

When you open the Administration Console, you are prompted to enter your username and password. Once that is done, console's Log In interface appears (see Figure 13). You will notice that the server is given a name and address (localhost) and that your password and username have already been entered. You can also tell the console to remember your password and automatically connect you to the server without logging in. These are personal decisions which, in many cases, will follow corporate policy. If you are unsure, check with those responsible. If everything is fine, click the Login button.

Figure 13. Administration Console's start screen

The next screen you see is the actual Administration Console (see Figure 14). There are a couple of things you need to pay attention to here. Over on the right side of the Task Bar is a green light. This is a visual indication that your server is humming along quite nicely. The Help button (question mark) gets you over to the FMS help files. Clicking the folder next to the question mark doesn't allow you to load stuff, as you might think. Instead, this button links directly to a number of FMS resources, ranging from this very article to FMS forums where you can ask questions of others in the FMS developer community.

Figure 14. Administration Console

At the top of the console you can choose how often the server refreshes the page. The choices range from one second to one minute; you can even pause the server's refresh rate. What you cannot do, however, is enter your own value. If you want to force a refresh, or if you're simply impatient, click the Refresh link in the upper right corner. Clicking the Logoff link shuts down the server completely.

Notice that there are three buttons across the top of the console. The one that is currently selected, View Applications, shows you the applications that are currently associated with FMS. These "applications" are actually called "instances" (I'll get to this in greater depth at a later date) but if you click the New Instance button in the lower left, a list of the applications/instances will appear, allowing you to load one simply by selecting it. Let's hold off on that for now. Instead, click the Manage Users button.

Clicking the Manage Users button reveals the screen shown in Figure 15. It allows you add users, remove users, and even change your password or their passwords. Why would you want to add users if this a local installation? You may be sharing this computer with others in your workgroup or this installation is actually located on a server. Just keep in mind that the development server allows only 10 simultaneous connections at any one time so this really is a testing server.

Figure 15. Managing users

To change a password, simply click a username and click the Reset Password button to open the Resetting Password dialog box (see Figure 16). Enter the new password twice and click the Reset Password button to make the change. If you change your mind, click Cancel to close the dialog box.

Figure 16. Changing a user password

Click the Manage Servers button to open the Manage Servers panel (see Figure 17). This area lets you see what is going on behind the scenes. The Details area graphically shows you the performance of any application that may be playing, as well as its bandwidth and CPU usage. The Connections button tells you how many servers are connected, and gives you a bit of information about the performance and status of the various servers. Applications tells you how many applications are currently running and their performance. Because you are using a development version, the License panel is irrelevant. Even so, there is a link at the bottom of the panel that permits you to upgrade to the interactive server. The last area, Server Log, gives you a log of what the server's been up to. Clear this out at any time by clicking the Clear Log button.

Figure 17. Manage Servers panel

There is one thing in this panel that you might wish to do: make sure the server is actually "localhost." Here's how. The middle button at the top of the Manage Servers panel—the one with the "AB"—is the Edit Server Log Information button. Click it to configure the server (see Figure 18). In the Server field, enter localhost. If you want to change your username and password, this is the place to do it. The reason you enter "localhost" is because this will be the RTMP address you use to test your applications. Make whatever changes and click the Save button.

Figure 18. Configuring the server as "localhost"

At this stage of the game, you are good to go, so quit the browser to close the Administration Console.

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