Connections Manager

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Why Use the Connections Manager

If you work with more than one broker — a local development instance, a staging cluster, a production site — the HUB remembers each one as a saved connection instead of a single remembered URL. Pick a broker from the list to sign in, probe every saved broker for reachability before you commit, and jump between brokers from the account menu without logging out and re-entering details.

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Adding a Connection

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Default connection (web / Docker)

A web HUB started with Docker can open New Connection with the broker already filled in, so a lab or demo does not make every visitor type the address. Set the variables on the HUB container. The HUB reads them when the container starts. The desktop app ignores them. Setting HUB_DEFAULT_CONNECTION_HOST turns the feature on. The other variables are optional. The values pre-fill the New Connection form only. They never create or rewrite a saved connection. The connection is stored when someone clicks Save or Connect, the same as a form they typed. The Compose example sets host broker, protocol mqtt, and port 1883 for a broker on the same Docker network.

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Saved Connections

Each saved connection appears as a card on the login screen, showing its name, broker URL, and a reachability status the HUB probes in the background. You can see whether that broker answers before you open it.

• Favorites — star a connection to pin it; use the All / Starred filter above the list to narrow the view.
• Reorder — drag a card to change its position in the list.
• Connect — pick an identity from the card’s dropdown and click Connect. With a card focused, the Enter key does the same.
• Edit or delete — open a card to change its details, or remove it entirely.

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Identities and Switch User

A single saved connection can hold more than one identity — for example a day-to-day account and an admin account on the same broker. Mark one identity as the default for that connection, and switch between the others from the account pill without leaving the app: choose Switch user to reconnect as a different identity on the current broker, or Switch broker to reconnect to a different saved connection (using that connection’s default identity). Both close the current session cleanly and reopen it against the new target. The rest of that menu is covered in Desktop shell.

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Securing a Connection with TLS

For mqtts:// and wss:// connections, open the connection’s detail panel to attach TLS material:

• A CA certificate, if the broker’s certificate isn’t already trusted by your system.
• A client certificate and private key, for brokers that require mutual TLS.

Server certificate verification is on by default for secure connections; only turn it off for trusted development brokers.

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When the Broker Is Not Coreflux

The HUB detects the broker when you connect. You do not pick a broker type. When the connection is a generic MQTT broker, the dock keeps Data Viewer and UNS Viewer. Connectors, the LoT Editor, LoT Flow, Dashboards, and Cluster stay hidden. The status bar offers Know more about Coreflux, which explains what a Coreflux broker adds and links to the docs, the install guide, and coreflux.org. The account menu does not show LoT Templates or broker administration. While the HUB is still checking, the dock shows those same two apps. Know more about Coreflux appears once the check settles on a generic broker. After that session, the saved card is tagged MQTT. A card tagged Coreflux means the last session reached a Coreflux broker, and the usual apps are available. The tag is absent until a session has settled.

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Where Credentials Are Stored

• Desktop app — passwords and the TLS private key are encrypted at rest using your operating system’s secure storage. They are never written to the plain settings file the HUB otherwise syncs to disk.
• Browser app — credentials are kept for the session and are not written to disk by the HUB; use your browser’s own security practices (a trusted device, a locked profile) when saving connections there.

The broker’s TLS certificate (the public part) can still be attached to a saved connection either way, since it isn’t sensitive.

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Coreflux account and fleet

Saved connections are the This machine tab: a host, a port, and a username you store in this HUB. Coreflux Fleet is the other tab. It lists brokers your organization registered at portal.coreflux.org and connects with your account token instead of a saved password. Fleet rows are not added to this list. See Account, fleet, and Cloud mode.

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Next Steps