Provision a backend site - Web application bridge

To provision a backend site, we use the Manage web application and WebDock portlets.

1. Register the backend application.

   Log on to the WAS admin console and go to...

   Applications | Application Types | WebSphere enterprise applications | wp.vwat.servlet.ear | Web Module Properties | Context Root For Web Modules

   ...then change the context root to /.

   Save your work then restart wp.vwat.servlet.ear.

   Applications already registered with another feature cannot be integrated with the web application bridge feature.

2. Choose an option to resolve Web server plug-in mapping issues...

   • Register the virtual web application to a back-end application through the Web application bridge.

     There are contexts to configure for the back-end application.

   • Use /* as a blanket mapping in the Web server plug-in.

     Limitations: Requests on contexts with no available mapping are handled through the Web application bridge; Performance hit because the Web server does not cache all resources; The Web server management console is no longer visible, therefore, error handling is disabled. The Web server is not able to show any error pages.

   • Use the virtual host mechanism in the Web server to map /* to WebSphere Portal.

     The Web server management console and other mappings can be configured against separate virtual hosts configured inside the Web server.

3. Log on to WebSphere Portal using the fully qualified host name.

4. To create a new category for the application components.
   Administration | Portlet Management | Virtual Web Application Manager | New | Application category

   To create a new application.

   Administration | Portlet Management | Virtual Web Application Manager | New | Application component

5. Set...
   • HTTP or HTTPS
   • Host from the list of available web servers.
   • Display name
   • Description
   • Category
   • Add users and groups to define access control permissions for the available roles.

   If you do not define the access control permissions for the available roles, every user can view all content.

6. On the Connection, Authentication, and Localization pages, accept defaults or enter your custom information...

   1. Click Connection to define how the browser communicates with the web application:

      • Select the allowed HTTP methods.

      • Choose to forward the existing user agent or select a custom user agent.

      • To change between allowing or disallowing the connection to persist, click button...
        Persist Connection

      • Set the read timeout.

      • Set the connection timeout.

      • Define the number of cookies allowed.

   2. Click Authentication to define how users authenticate with the web application:

      • Select the appropriate authentication type and then fill in any additional parameters for that type:

        None	No authentication is required to access the backend server.
        HTTP	Access to the backend server requires basic authentication
        Form	Access to the backend server requires a form, such as Gmail. For apps with complex client identity features, such as Yahoo, WAB may not be able to access the application. When a user session times out, WAB re-authenticates with the backend server. Until the user logs out or the session times out, if a user provides incorrect credentials in the Personalized mode, there is no error message about the wrong credentials.
        IWA	Use SPNEGO as the web authenticator. Allows user to get logged in with a token transfer from the Active Directory server.

      • Add authentication parameters for headers, cookies, and filters.

   3. Click Localization to add any additional languages supported for the web application.

7. Save the application.

8. Add the web application to a page.

   Only add the WebDock portlet to a page that inherits the portal default theme and has a full profile.

   1. If necessary, log on to WebSphere Portal as the administrator using the fully qualified host name.

   2. Set profile override for the page. Go to...
      Administration | Manage Pages | Content Root | New Page | Edit Page Properties icon | Advanced options | I want to set parameters

      ...then set...

      Parameter	Value
      resourceaggregation.profile	Profile override for the page. For example... profiles/profile_full.json

   3. Click OK to save the new parameter.

   4. Click OK to save the changes to the page properties.

   5. Add WebDock to page...
      Edit mode | Content tab | WebDock portlet | Add to page icon | Save

   6. Select Edit Shared Settings from the WebDock portlet display menu, then provide the URL and host information.

      The URL is everything other than the host information in the full URL.

   7. Click Save.

   8. Select Personalize from the WebDock portlet display menu, then enter the user ID and password.

   9. Save your changes

   To access the Page containing the WebDock portlet grant the privileged user role.

   If there are multiple WebDock portlets on a page, all the users accessing that page must have access to the application, which is defined on the Basic tab of the VWATManager portlet.

When accessing the page for the first time, users might be required to provide credentials.

See

• Duplicate an application component
  
• Edit the application component
  
• Edit the WebDock portlet
  

Parent: The web application bridge