Manual Chapter :
Creating User-Defined URL Categories and
Filters for APM
Applies To:
Show Versions
BIG-IP APM
- 16.0.1, 16.0.0, 15.1.0
Creating User-Defined URL Categories and
Filters for APM
Overview: Configuring user-defined URL categories and filters
On a BIG-IP system without a URL database, if you want to control traffic
based on the type of URL being requested, and you have many URLs to consider, you should
configure user-defined URL categories and user-defined URL filters. This approach provides good
performance, ease-of-use, and the ability to use the
URL Category
and the
URL Filter Assign
agents in a per-request policy. If you have only a few URLs that you want to treat differently, you can probably skip creating
user-defined URL categories and filters and use a simple
URL Branching
agent in a per-request policy. In this case, you specify the URLs that you want to match directly
in the URL Branching
agent. To configure user-defined
URL categories and URL filters, complete these
tasks.
Task summary
Configuring user-defined URL
categories
Configure a user-defined URL
category to specify a group of URLs over which you want to control access.
- On the Main tab, click .The URL Categories table displays. If you have not created any URL categories, the table is empty.
- ClickCreate.The Category Properties screen displays.
- In theNamefield, type a unique name for the URL category.
- From theDefault Actionlist, retain the default valueBlock; or, selectAllow.A Confirm Box action in a per-request policy subroutine serves the purpose of enabling appropriate choices in a forward proxy (outbound) configuration. Currently, Access Policy Manager does not support a similar action for reverse proxy.
- Add, edit, or delete the URLs that are associated with the category by updating theAssociated URLslist.
- To add URLs to theAssociated URLslist:
- In theURLfield, type a URL.You can type a well-formed URL that the system must match exactly or type a URL that includes globbing patterns (wildcards) for the system to match URLs.
- If you typed globbing patterns in theURLfield, select theGlob Pattern Matchcheck box .
- ClickAdd.The URL displays in theAssociated URLslist.
These are well-formed URLs:- https://www.siterequest.com/
- http://www.siterequest.com:8080/
- http://www.sitequest.com/docs/siterequest.pdf/
- http://www.sitequest.com/products/application-guides/
This URL*siterequest.[!comru]includes globbing patterns that match any URL that includessiterequest, except forsiterequest.comorsiterequest.ru.This URL*://siterequest.com/education/*includes globbing patterns that match any HTTP URL that includessiterequest.com/education, but that do not match any HTTPS URLs if Category Lookup specifies that the input is SNI or CN.Subject.For SNI or CN.Subject input, Category Lookup usesscheme:://hostfor matching, instead of matching the whole URL. - ClickFinished.The URL Categories screen displays.
- To view the newly created URL category, expandCustom Categories.The custom URL category displays in the Sub-Category column.
Add or edit a URL filter to specify
an action (allow, block, or confirm) for the custom category.
Configuring
user-defined URL filters
You configure a URL filter to specify how to
process requests for content in URL categories: allow, block, or confirm access. You can
configure multiple URL filters.
- On the Main tab, click .You can click the name of any filter to view its settings.The URL Filters screen displays.
- To configure a new URL filter, click one of these options.
- Createbutton: Click to start with a URL filter that allows all categories.
- Copylink: Click for an existing URL filter in the table to start with its settings.
- In theNamefield, type a unique name for the URL filter.
- ClickFinished.The screen redisplays. An Associated Categories table displays. It includes each URL category and the filtering action that is currently assigned to it. The table includes a Sub-Category column. Any URL categories that were added by administrators are subcategories withinCustom Categories
- To specify that you want to block access to particular categories or subcategories, select them and clickBlock.When you select a category, you also select the related subcategories. You can expand the category and clear any subcategory selections.
- To specify that you want to allow access to particular categories or subcategories, select them and clickAllow.
- To specify that you want the user to confirm access for particular categories or subcategories, select them and clickConfirm.
To use a URL filter, you must include a URL Filter
item in a per-request policy. A per-request policy runs each time a user makes a URL
request.
