Architecture
A secure bridge between Aderant and Clio Operate. Matters flow from your on-premises practice management system through a hardened proxy layer into Clio Operate. No data is written until a person explicitly clicks Import. The diagram below is live — each connection shows its current response time.
Live architecture
Checking…PMS Sync Portal
Alterspective Cloud · this UI
Where staff preview matters and trigger imports.
Import Proxy
Alterspective Cloud
The only bridge between the cloud and the client estate. Applies field mappings; holds no client data at rest.
Cloud services the proxy calls
Clio Operate
Clio Cloud
Identity (Keystone)
Alterspective Cloud
DB Proxy (on-prem agent)
Client On-Premises
Read-only HTTP agent behind the client firewall. Turns SQL into JSON.
Aderant SQL Server
Client On-Premises
The practice-management system of record — matters, parties, clients.
A single import, end to end
- 1
Search or enter a matter number
The portal calls the API Proxy, which reads the matter from the on-premise SQL API agent over the tunnel.
- 2
Preview is rendered
The API Proxy applies the field mapping and shows you the Clio Operate shape — no writes yet.
- 3
Click Import
The API Proxy checks for an existing Clio Operate work item with the same Aderant matter ID. If found, it returns the link instead of importing again.
- 4
Parties become ODS entities
Each Aderant party is created as a standalone ODS entity, tagged with its Aderant name reference for future deduplication.
- 5
Work item created and linked
A Clio Operate work item is created with the mapped attributes. ODS parties are linked as participants in their Aderant roles.
- 6
You are added as contributor
The signed-in user is stamped as a contributor participant so the matter is immediately visible to them.
- 7
Audit record stored
The import is recorded in History — matter number, work item reference, who, when, outcome.
Safety guarantees
- Preview is fully read-only — no Clio Operate or Aderant writes.
- Import writes are gated by a per-organisation enable flag.
- Idempotency check prevents duplicate Clio Operate work items.
- Per-organisation credentials are isolated via runtime header injection.
- Every import is audited (user, time, outcome) and shown in History.
On the roadmap
Two-way sync
Changes in Clio Operate flow back to Aderant. Matters can be flagged for two-way sync on import today — the flag is honoured automatically when the feature ships.
Bulk import
Queue many matters at once with progress reporting.
Aderant write-back (Phase 2)
Create and update records in Aderant through an on-premise REST/CRUD proxy. Not yet stood up.