First Off, What is Cloudpath?
First Off, What is Cloudpath?Ruckus recently purchased Cloudpath networks, a wireless onboarding company. Cloudpath specializes in getting users, whether staff, guest, or students onto your network securely and easily. The Cloudpath product has a lot of success in BYOD-type deployments in schools, offices, and large Wi-Fi deployments with mixed devices. Cloudpath got a lot of early adoption due to it being one of the first onboarding platforms that supported Chromebooks, and remains one of the ones that works best with them.
Cloudpath is a virtual appliance (XpressConnect) that allows the creation of a workflow. The workflow is a series of steps to perform the client authentication or registration that the admin wants the client to perform. After the client authenticates or registers, an enrollment process will begin for the user that incorporates installing the necessary certificates and profiles for the SSID, which includes security settings. On top of that, you can also provide VLANS, implement ACLS, or certain policies for certain groups of users.
There are a few other very neat features of Cloudpath. It does not only authenticate users, but it can also provide health and compliance checks of the computers requesting to connect to ensure that computer meets the best practice policies that admin sets. For example, it will check against policies such as the firewall being enabled, AV being on, and that the OS version is at a level desired to be on the network (in other words, no Windows 98 computers on my Wi-Fi!). It can also be its own radius server and certificate authority, which sets it apart from a lot of the other onboarding platforms out there.
One of the awesome things about Cloudpath is that it has a installable client for almost every OS/device that might need to connect. This makes client interoperability almost seamless, along with the support burden being heavily reduced on the IT staff’s side.
Once these users enroll, they will not need to do it again, and will connect automatically in the future.
There are a myriad of other benefits and features on the Cloudpath platform that we’d be happy to show you.
Benefits to Current and Future Ruckus Users
Ruckus is not only Wi-Fi’s most innovative company, but now hopes to be the company that can get your users online securely the easiest way. By leveraging Ruckus’s ability to provide great Wi-Fi along with Cloudpath’s ability to easily get hundreds or thousands of consumer owned products online, Ruckus hopes to give us the next level wireless user experience.
As of now, Cloudpath can still be downloaded and installed as a free trial for users to get a feel for what it offers. Ruckus has been very strong on stating that Cloudpath will stay Cloudpath, but will integrate heavily with Ruckus products. That means that although it is a subsidiary of Ruckus Wireless and will work very well with their products, it will also work with ANY wireless vendor.
I Have Cloudpath, but Not Ruckus – Do I Have to Switch?
No, Cloudpath is deployed all over the world with many different vendors, ranging from Cisco, Aruba, to small AP brands. If you currently have Cloudpath and not Ruckus, you will not have to upgrade or change AP vendors. Ruckus has been very firm on this.
What is Changing, and Can I Get a Demo or Test?
As of now Ruckus is working with Cloudpath engineers to help streamline the interface and make it much simpler and more user friendly. The new version is not available yet.
How Can Mirazon help?
Mirazon was a Cloudpath partner before the acquisition and we have great knowledge and experience with the product. We also have excellent Wi-Fi and Ruckus expertise. Put them both together, and we’re very able to help support or install Ruckus’s Cloudpath with ANY vendor, and would be more than happy to help customers bridge the gap between Ruckus and Cloudpath and implement a great onboarding solution for any BYOD or general wireless deployment.