Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct Reviews

The majority use case for Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is for file transfer, specifically secure file transfer.

The most valuable aspect of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is the encryption technology, the proprietary protocol of Connect:Direct that encrypts the files to be transferred. It secures transfers via internet as well as via extranet. It has been extremely secure, and that is the main USP of this product. It is very easy to install and very easy to configure and use.

The advanced scheduling feature of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct, called File Agent, is useful. File Agent works on scheduling whenever a file arrives, triggering file transfer immediately, and within a second, the GBs of file will be transferred in five minutes or so.

For real-time monitoring with Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct, it is up to the standard. They have a separate utility called ICC, Sterling Control Center, which gives an additional add-on. If you use Control Center, you can monitor, schedule, and report, with the capability to see the usage of all your nodes in one single tool. That is a plus point. Logging and monitoring are very easy there, as is the reporting part. If you utilize the Director, you can configure and do all patching as well.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is available for handling large file transfers across different platforms such as mainframe to Windows to UNIX to Tandem; it covers all operating systems. It also has the ability to do EDI transfers, which is a significant add-on point. XML file automations can also be possible with Connect:Direct. It is a very extensive tool that, if utilized correctly, can do anything. However, the utilization is not up to the mark and being utilized by people. This product is capable of handling all tasks.

Based on experience, the one area IBM can improve for Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is the support mechanism. While support is available 24/7 whenever required, the solution time during American hours can take longer. In general, during American hours, the resource availability is not up to the standard. However, availability of support staff during UK timings or GMT timings is very good; they are supportive and helpful.

Functionality-wise, they can make additional improvements to Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct. They recently improved by adding a GUI for configurations on Windows as well as UNIX platforms, which is very helpful. However, the web client is cumbersome and not as interactive as it should be. The CLI part is comprehensive, but the GUI needs improvement.

I have been working with Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct for around 13 to 14 years now.

My experience with network interruption while using Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct depends on the network utilized. There is excellent functionality that creates a checkpoint while transferring. For instance, if you are transferring a file of a GB and a network interruption happens while it transfers 400 MB, as soon as the network reconnects, it starts the transfer from 400 MB itself, not transferring the whole file again. Checkpoints can be set for MB, for example, every 50 MB, or even for smaller files, although checkpoints for very small files in KBs are not a use case. For regular 100 MB transfers, checkpoints for each MB allow easy reconnection and resuming transfers from where they left off. That is the beauty of this product; it encompasses everything one can think of.

From a stability perspective, Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct rates as the best solution on a scale from one to ten.

Regarding scalability, Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is very scalable, with an installation process that takes hardly 30 minutes to complete.

The initial setup process for Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is relatively simple. For my organization, we utilize a file that requires customization after installation. The installation is very easy, needing just a click to get it running on the servers. If everything is pre-populated into the configuration, it sets up connectivity between two systems for testing. Currently, we use a Chef client for automation installation, with an API pipeline that triggers whenever a user orders Connect:Direct. The installation can be completed in less than half an hour, including the approval process.

The main competitor in the market for Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is Axway CFT. In my opinion, Axway CFT is the better product. If I must choose which product to utilize, I would definitely pick Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct, as it is cheaper than Axway. It is in the mid-range but provides very good functionality that justifies the cost.

Integration with my IT infrastructure using Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is very straightforward. We have APIs, and Connect:Direct works via API connections. It has two ports: one transfer port and one API port for commands, which is really helpful when integrating this product with any other product. On a scale of one to ten, I rate Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct a 9.5.

The primary use case of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is to transmit data. It offers two modes of transfers: SFTP, which is straightforward, and FTPS, which provides secure file transfer. A significant advantage is its versatility across various operating systems. It supports Mainframe, iOS, HP NonStop, Linux, Windows, and many other platforms, allowing node-to-node transmission regardless of the OS. This feature is particularly beneficial as long as the trading partner is also using Sterling Connect:Direct.

The most valuable feature of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is its ability to transmit files securely and efficiently, regardless of how frequently files are transmitted, even if it's just one file a day. The solution has become even more robust with its containerized version, especially for UNIX, which is purely Linux-based. Containerization offers complete orchestration benefits, allowing for multiple Connect:Direct pods to be deployed on the same server.

I do not find anything that needs improvement in Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct as a product. I have been supporting this solution, and it serves billions of customers well. Capgemini, in collaboration with IBM, conducts comprehensive testing and R&D. However, a complex setup for clusters could be enhanced, though IBM provides support with it through their professional services team.

I have been using Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct for six years and one month as of the time of the review.

The stability of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is highly praised. I would rate it ten out of ten for its reliability.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is highly scalable. I would give it another ten out of ten rating for scalability, making it suitable for any company size.

Technical support from IBM is exceptional, with a rating of ten plus one. The response time and quality are impressive, ensuring customer satisfaction.

The initial setup of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct can be simple. However, deploying it in a cluster introduces some complexity, albeit not too much. IBM's team is available to provide necessary deployment assistance.

An IBM team is available to assist with deployment. They offer comprehensive professional services to ensure smooth implementation.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct's main competitor is Axway. IBM gets an edge because it supports orchestration and provides robust cloud support, along with twenty-four/seven assistance.

For Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct, my overall rating is ten out of ten. The product is highly stable and scalable, with excellent technical support from IBM.

The primary use case for Connect Direct is for transferring data from Linux or Unix systems to mainframe systems. I am the mainframe support person responsible for Connect Direct, Xcom, and other products. 

My task is to compare this product with Connect Direct and Xcom. This task involves evaluating which is the best product to maintain the integrity of critical data files for a bank's special data transfer needs.

One valuable feature of Connect Direct is its capability to recover from any communication issues through its dedicated transfer processes. This differentiates it from FTP Common. 

Furthermore, Connect Direct offers Check Point functionality to ensure data integrity during transfers. The data is transferred reliably from Linux or Unix systems to the mainframe. 

Additionally, Connect Direct and Xcom are used within the banks to maintain data transfer integrity. 

Moreover, all banks use Connect Direct and TecCom, which shows the product's acceptance and reliability.

I do not have any notes for improvement. 

My experience with Connect Direct is very small. I recently started working on this issue yesterday and today. I am researching to find the best solution for a specific data transfer.

This is my first time working on this particular program, so I don't have an opinion on stability yet.

Connect Direct is quite scalable. However, I do not need IBM support because there are no specific problems observed. I am only evaluating the best product. Connect Direct is scalable.

In my experience with IBM, I worked for them for ten years in host network support. I've interacted with their customer service many times. 

Overall, it was a good experience, and IBM customer service was generally supportive and efficacious.

Positive

The deployment and setup are straightforward. It requires significant effort within the bank's environment to ensure the integrity of data files. There is a thorough comparison among NetScom, Connect Direct, and Control MCTP.

It takes a year to implement the whole solution properly, particularly due to its complexity and specificity for special transfers.

I evaluate Connect Direct, Xcom, and Control MCTP to determine the best solution for maintaining data integrity during specific transfers required by a bank.

Although I don't remember the precise experiences with IBM support from the past, I found the assistance generally satisfactory. 

My role mainly involved supporting the network in a host environment. Currently, my evaluation is ongoing. All banks use Connect Direct and Xcom, which indicates the solution's reliability. I don't have any particular suggestions for IBM. 

On a scale of one to ten, I would rate the solution as an eight out of ten. While it generally performs well, there are always minor issues and improvements in data transfer integrity that can be made.

The solution is a proprietary tool built by Sterling, which was acquired by IBM. It is a peer-to-peer file transfer protocol. If I want to send data from one location to another, the solution should first be installed in both locations. Only then can we transfer the data.

The solution's good point is that it has never been breached compared to other tools. The solution's file transfer speed is quite high. You can send GBs of data within a couple of minutes.

The solution's licensing cost is too high. The resources required for this tool are costly and not easily available in the market. I have faced issues with the certificates. We get issues if our source and destination Connect:Direct nodes do not have the latest TLS 1.2.

Installing the solution is quite difficult because only an experienced person can do it. Newcomers will not be able to configure the entire solution.

I have been using Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct for eight and a half years.

The initial setup of the solution is not straightforward because it's not GUI-based. If you are installing the solution on a UNIX server, you should have a basic understanding of UNIX. You should know how to go from one directory to another, what the config files are, how to edit those files, and how to get the backup of those files.

You need a little technical knowledge for it. The developers working on the solution are very costly for the organization. Also, the complexity of having this kind of setup is very difficult.

This solution is only used by giant financial companies like BNY Mellon, Barclays, and JPMorgan Chase. They cannot replace the solution because they have several files transferred internally using it. It is very difficult and cost-consuming for them to change, migrate, or upgrade their system. That's the reason they are not able to do it very easily.

The solution's licensing cost is too high. I don't know about the solution's licensing cost, but it would definitely be based on the number of concurrent sessions we have. If four files are sent simultaneously, it amounts to four sessions. Similarly, if I wanted to send 40 files, I should have the license for 40 sessions. Only then can we send the data from 40 files from source to destination at the same time.

When I consider the performance and use case, I would definitely rate the solution a nine out of ten. However, when I consider the licensing cost, criticality, and complexity of the tool, I rate the solution a six or seven out of ten because we also have to manage the TLS certificates.

The solution has automation capabilities. Whenever the file is available on the source path, we have to trigger that file manually. We have batch jobs running and submitting the processes. Whenever the process is submitted, we will get the PID (Process ID) or the Connect:Direct ID. Whenever we send the file, it will generate a code. We need to get that code, and we need to check the logs.

For example, we need to open Connect:Direct and type the command. When you type the command, you will get the entire thing where the source and entire copy steps are mentioned. In the copy step, if you see the successful, it means that the files are delivered successfully. So, the copy step is very important there.

People who want any MFT tool should not use the solution because of its high licensing cost. The developers who will work on it are costly and not easily available. Any company that only wants to deal with file transfers can explore other tools like JSCAPE, MOVEit, Globalscape, or GoAnywhere.

Overall, I rate the solution a six or seven out of ten.

We use Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct primarily for transferring files using different protocols like SFPP and FTPS. We also use the mailbox platform and certified gateway connectors.

It has helped our organization by providing flexibility in handling different types of encrypted files. We can receive an encrypted file, decrypt it, change its name or file extension, and route it to anyone inside or outside the company. This capability to transform files is very beneficial for us.

The most valuable feature of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is its flexibility with encryption. I can receive an encrypted file, decrypt it, change the file name or extension, and route it to anyone inside or outside the company.

The package that IBM delivers does not come with many premade tools or templates. This means we have to create a lot of things by ourselves, which requires more work. We have a team of four to five people just to develop map-based programs. Additionally, the initial setup could be simpler and better.

We have been using Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct for a long time. We only use the certified gateway with connectors, and any protocol used must go through a connector.

We have not experienced any issues with the stability of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct. It is a very robust system.

We have a very robust infrastructure, so we didn't need to grow our environment much. We mainly had to grow our file system due to the large number of files. The scalability of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct supports our business growth well.

The initial setup of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct could be simpler and better. It is not something that can be easily done without some knowledge and experience.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is an expensive platform.

Ensure you have a knowledgeable team to handle the setup and maintenance of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct due to its complexity.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

Its primary use case is secure file transmission. We are currently providing support for it to a client. They are using ConnectDirect in their environment, and it is a vast implementation of ConnectDirect. 

The most valuable feature is that it provides 100% reliability for file transmission. It ensures that files get delivered in a secure manner. When you use Connect:Direct, your file 100% gets delivered to the next delivery location. If the log shows that a file got delivered, it will have all the transmitted data without truncation or other data issues.

It is improving consistently. IBM is providing all the new patches for enhancements and any vulnerabilities related to security. They recently did the Log4j remediation. They have File Agent, which is an additional utility and a component of Connect:Direct, for automated file transmission. In that utility, there is some issue with the file name. There is a limitation on the file name, and that is being fixed by IBM.

It has been 8 years and 10 months.

It is 100% stable. Many different companies are using this tool for secure and accelerated file transmission. It is being used by the banking chains, and it is a very stable tool because it does not have that much complexity. If you use this tool, you will have 100% delivery assurance. It is a very stable tool.

It is scalable.

They are very helpful. Whenever you raise a case, it generally takes about 24 hours to get a complete solution on that, but if it is something that requires additional support or enhancements, then it can take a while. In such a case, it can take a week or a maximum of 15 days to get a proper solution.

They are replacing SFTP with Connect:Direct because it is more reliable and efficient, and it has faster transmission capabilities.

The setup depends on the requirement. In the current environment or current project, we have it as a middleware. We have other tools for displaying the output of a file, and there is an application that is taking it to the display servers so that it can display the data. That is one implementation in the current project. There are also multiple implementations for their finance-related file transmission because that requires security. All the financial data is automatically transferred by the Connect:Direct whenever the application team puts a file into one of the directories. We provide the directory where they need to put the file. We have the automation job that picks up the file and delivers it to the user or the application that needs to utilize that file.

Its setup is straightforward. The concept is straightforward. All the related information is also available on the internet. If any of the newbies want to check or get some info on Connect:Direct, they can go to the IBM site, and they will get all the details regarding the implementation, configuration, and any issues they are facing. They can just check with the error message, and they will be able to get some details about it.

It is a pretty straightforward tool. In open systems servers, the setup and configuration take 10 minutes or less than that. It also supports silent installation, which hardly takes two minutes.

It can be deployed anywhere. It supports on-premises and cloud deployments. IBM recently provided a patch for cloud HPE servers. There were a few vulnerabilities that caused data leaks, and they have fixed that in their recent updates.

I don't have much idea about the price. Customers take care of the price. We are only supporting projects for customers.

I would advise being familiar with this tool before doing the implementation. It is a cross-platform tool, and you can utilize it on any operating system, but I would recommend using it with Unix or shell for more efficient transfer flows. You can automate through shell scripting, which is free and economical for implementation.

There is an additional encryption capability of Connect:Direct to transmit data in encrypted form where the tunnel is getting encrypted. In that one, you don't need to use the open SSL certificate because that will not be very reliable. That's one lesson that I have learned by using this tool.

I would rate it a 10 out of 10. It is the best tool.

We are using Connect:Direct to move some application files from point to point, from one application to another application, which might be used by another application and which should maybe use the tool process and make selections on these files. So, simply, we are using Connect:Direct to move one application to another application.

For me, automation is the most valuable feature.

There is room for improvement in monitoring. We don't have good visibility tools and monitoring, so I believe there may be some enhancement needed in its monitoring dashboard.

I have been using this solution for four years.

Overall, it has good stability.

It is a scalable solution. There are about 21 people using the solution.

There is a ticketing system. There is a ticket and a support website. And if I'm going to local support, this window has a local portal, and they can raise tickets as well.

The setup was done by the vendor. It was not our responsibility to install the solution.

It took a couple of hours to completely deploy the solution.

The pricing model is excellent. It is not expensive.

Overall, I would rate it a six out of ten. Sometimes we face issues and can't figure out the cause of failures. It impacts our business, and we have to find the root cause. But we faced a bad situation when we couldn't route calls properly. I have to investigate the issue to avoid it in the future. It's challenging when there's no support from management.

We use Sterling Commerce ConnectDirect for limited transfers where the third party only wants to use this protocol. 

Currently we have five administrators that manage, maintain and set-up the exchanges with other partners.

We are actually looking to decommission this product to migrate to IBM's Sterling B2B Integrator because it is has a built-in Connect Direct and is easier to manage.

The most valuable feature of this solution is the security.

The product could be improved by making the user interface more user-friendly. Adding nodes, connections and managing the support is too complicated. 

Sterling Commerce ConnectDirect would be better if it had a reverse proxy integrated into the DMZ because usually the nodes are installed directly on secure sites internally. We need to put them through additional servers, which is not easy to do. If the product came with its own DMZ portion server it would be helpful.

I have been using this solution for five years.

Sterling Commerce ConnectDirect is a stable product and has never gone down or had maintenance issues.

This solution is used for high volume transfers so scalability is not an issue.

The technical support is the number one problem. Every time there is an incident or ticket opened, the first response from IBM is to send you a link to a page that is a similar problem. They do not take the time and effort to actually read your problem.

We did not use a previous product, Sterling Commerce Connect Direct is only used when a third=party vendor indicates that it's the only option for security.

The initial setup of Sterling Commerce was complex. Troubleshooting an issue has too many possibilities of multiple failure points. To diagnosis, a problem is extensive and takes too long to find the issue.

The deployment did not take very long. The installation of the product itself was simple, however, the integration of clients and transfers to put in place was complicated.

We implemented the solution ourselves.

We have not seen a return on investment. It is an additional cost to overhead to use Sterling Commerce ConnectDirect. The knowledge and support required is something you need to learn. To use this product you need special expensive licenses.

The licensing is on a yearly basis.

At the time, there was no other option available or acceptable to the third-party vendor.

IBM B2B Integrator could easily answer the Connect Direct need instead of having pure Connect Direct.

I would rate this solution a 5 out of 10.

We mainly use this solution for node-to-node file transmissions.

The Security Plus feature of this solution is excellent, and allows you to send encrypted files very securely to remote destinations.

This solution cannot be deployed on a root_squash NFS, which limits superuser privileges.

I have been working with this solution for three and a half years.

This is a very stable solution, in our experience.

We have found that scalability is possible with this product, but it is not straightforward.

The setup of this solution is very simple, and deployment only took 10 minutes.

I would encourage any organization implementing this solution, to give access to every potential user during the initial configuration; scaling up with this product is complicated, once the initial implementation has been carried out.

I would rate this solution a 10 out of 10.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct can be deployed in many ways. We mainly deploy it on-premise, because the cloud and hybrid deployments are more recent. It's has been in the last five years that they have been implementing the cloud and hybrid versions. I had been installing and providing services in a hybrid role with containers, on-premise, public cloud, and private cloud for different customers.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is an MFT solution, and in this case, IBM offers the same solution that can also work for B2B, such as file translation. These are solutions that are independent of the industry of the customer. For example, I live in Spain and the target market was finance. I work on several different finance customers with some specific use cases. In Italy, for example, I work with logistics, distribution, manufacturing and the use case are different. In the financial sector, we propose the MFT solution to banks in corporate areas to get the onboarding of the customers of the banks. It allows each bank to propose to their customer a file sent automatically using each type of protocol and providing a lot of facilities. If we talk with the logistic or distribution departments they are most focused on EDI messages to interchange with their providers, such as orders, invoices, and dispatch advisement. 

With IBM it is on the same solution. Depending on the target market where we move on, we can identify a different business case. In the last two years in the financial market, consider that there is a huge migration of standards related to SWIFT. All the banks around the world must translate their MT messages, SWIFT messages, to ISO 20022. We are proposing a combination of the MFT solution with the ITX, that is the IBM mapper. This is the use case most used in the last two years, more or less.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is a solution that is on the market for a very long time. There is an integrator that has been developed and evolves every year. On the roadmap, there is always a new integration. For example, it's one of the solutions in the market that out of the box can handle EBICS protocol. The file processing is done very well. By default, there are a lot of configurations that can be customized.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is one of the stronger MFT solutions in the market, it is available in each type of installation, and offers SaaS, PaaS, YaaS, on-premise. It can allow the customer to do everything on the file interchange.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct could improve by adding some of the functionality that some other vendors have. For example, GoAnywhere has call agents, which are small clients that can be installed on the endpoints and can be handled by the central point on the server. If I want to do this with the IBM solution, I have to sell a lot of account addresses. The price could be unprofitable for the customer. There is some small functionality that could be implemented and could be easily done to improve this solution.

I have been using Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct for 15 years.

Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is stable vertically and horizontally.

This solution is scalable both horizontally and vertically. While using containers it's automatically scalable. For example, by using Kubernetes. I can add many clusters. I can power on the system that was implemented and I can tune the solution in order to use more resources of the system.

In the first two, three years that I used the solution after IBM acquired it, we had some issues because the technical team was not skilled. We had some more delays with technical resolutions. After three or four years, we did not have any large issues. On the new development, we have some issues with the use cases. For example, in the integration of Kafka, we don't have a lot of experience. We did not get a lot of information from the support about how it should work, or how it is normally supported to work. Overall the support we have received has been good.

I have used many other solutions, such as GoAnywhere or HelpSystem. When comparing this solution to GoAnywhere, we have to customize everything but in Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct it's not necessary.

The on-premise deployment it's quite easy to install. For example, the new load has little impact on the workflow of the projects that are running.

The price and licensing of Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct is expensive. The containers can allow the customer to have flexibility in the ability to move the container on the cloud. They have to purchase all the containers that they need. Even if most of them can be switched off, it's quite expensive compared with the other offering. The other offering that is related to PBU and based on the power of the machines, sometimes it's quite expensive for the use case that we found. Other vendors, such as Primero, which sold specific license packages, such as by protocol, are most competitive than the licensing of IBM.

I used to offer this solution when the customer had more than one use case. One business case, or some business case with a lot of budgets or a lot of revenue. Otherwise, I used to propose different solutions, such as Software AG, AppSystem, or Primero, that are good challengers because they are smaller solutions for smaller businesses and use cases.

I rate Sterling Commerce Connect:Direct an eight out of ten.