HOWTO: Reduce Zetafax Client network traffic over a WAN link

ZTN1351

ID: ZTN1351

This Zetafax technical note applies to:

• Zetafax 5.5 and later

Summary

When using Zetafax without the email gateway, all faxes, network addresses and user configuration details are stored on the Zetafax Server machine. In order to update the status of sent and received faxes and monitor any changes in the user's configuration, every Zetafax Client contacts the Zetafax Server every 10 seconds.

On most LANs (Local Area Networks), this traffic does not cause any problems. However, this could potentially slow down the network traffic if there is a limited WAN (Wide Area Network) or VPN (Virtual Private Network) link between the Zetafax Client and the Zetafax Server. For example, this scenario occurs if you have two sites connected by a WAN, and some of the Zetafax Clients are in a different site than the Zetafax Server.

This technical note explains how to increase the Zetafax Client's polling interval to reduce the amount of network traffic.

More information

To reduce the amount of times that the Zetafax Client will contact the Zetafax Server, follow this procedure on every Zetafax workstation at the remote site.

WARNING: Using Registry Editor incorrectly can cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Equisys cannot guarantee that problems resulting from the incorrect use of Registry Editor can be solved.

For information about how to edit the registry, view the " Changing Keys and Values" Help topic in Registry Editor (REGEDIT.EXE) or the " Add and Delete Information in the Registry" and " Edit Registry Data" Help topics in REGEDT32.EXE. Note that you should back up the registry before you edit it. If you are running Windows NT or Windows 2000, you should also update your Emergency Repair Disk (ERD).

1. Open the Registry Editor on the Zetafax Client machine.
2. Locate the following key in the Registry:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Equisys\Zetafax\Client

3. Find or add the string value called StatusTimer.
4. Set the value of StatusTimer to the desired number of seconds. This will make the Zetafax Client wait that number of seconds before contacting the Zetafax Server to check for new faxes or update the status of sent faxes.
5. Close the Registry Editor.

Please note that applying this procedure will cause the Zetafax Client to update the status of sent and received faxes a lot more slowly than it normally would. A suitable compromise should be found between reducing the network traffic and allowing the Zetafax Client to stay updated.

References

For additional information on configuring the Zetafax Client, please see the following resources:

                      Zetafax Client online help

Last updated: 04 July 2005 (EB/SV/EB)