Features of PurchaseHQ from ISC Software: Secure access

This post is part of the Features of PurchaseHQ from ISC Software, as well as part of the over-arching GP Elementz from ISC Software series.

One of the key principles behind the development of PurchaseHQ was that it be secure and, unlike the Web Services for Microsoft Dynamics GP, it uses a version of the TLS standard which is not being retired in 2020.

PurchaseHQ has four components:

1. The Portal itself, which is hosted on Microsoft Azure, providing a robust, scalable platform for users to access and which is protected with an SSL certificate.
2. The Azure Relay which handles communication from the Connector Service to and from the Portal.
3. The Connector Service which is installed on a server in your domain and which initiates and handles communication to and from the SQL Server to the Portal.
4. The Client Components which are installed on the Microsoft Dynamics GP clients and allow users to configure PurchaseHQ and maintain which users have access to log onto the portal.

Structure diagram for PurchaseHQ

No data is held on the Portal on Azure and no communication channels are initiated by the Portal; instead all data is held in databases on the SQL Server with all communication initiated by the Connector Service outbound, meaning that no ports need to be opened on the firewall for PurchaseHQ t be used. This is an advantage of PurchaseHQ over the email actions available with the standard Web Services approvals which require a port (48620 by default) to be opened for inward bound communications.