Manual Chapter : Hosting Files with Portal Access on Access Policy Manager

Applies To:

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BIG-IP APM

  • 17.1.0, 17.0.0, 16.1.4, 16.1.3, 16.1.2, 16.1.1, 16.1.0, 16.0.1, 16.0.0, 15.1.9, 15.1.8, 15.1.7, 15.1.6, 15.1.5, 15.1.4, 15.1.3, 15.1.2, 15.1.1, 15.1.0, 15.0.1, 15.0.0, 14.1.5, 14.1.4, 14.1.3, 14.1.2, 14.1.0, 14.0.1, 14.0.0, 13.1.5, 13.1.4, 13.1.3, 13.1.1, 13.1.0
Manual Chapter

Hosting Files with Portal Access on Access Policy Manager

About using hosted files with a Portal Access resource

You can use hosted content that you have uploaded to the BIG-IP Access Policy Manager to provide the resource and resource items for a Portal Access resource.
When you use hosted content for a Portal Access resource, the link on the webtop for the portal access resource opens a file hosted on the system, instead of a URI. You configure the main Portal Access resource as this linked file. You then configure this file, and all related and required files, as resource items of this file.
In this example, a simple web page consisting of an HTML file, a CSS file, a JavaScript file, and an image are uploaded to a directory in the hosted content repository. The files are then specified as a Portal Access resource and resource items.
File
Location
Description
index.html
/index.html
The main web page that displays when the link is clicked. This is the Portal Access Resource.
styles.css
/styles.css
The CSS file for the page index.html.
test_image.jpg
/test_image.jpg
An image that is referenced on the page index.html.
script.js
/js/script.js
A JavaScript file that is referenced from the page index.html.
In this example, hosted content is uploaded as a single
ZIP
file,
test.zip
, then extracted to the location
/test
on the server.

Uploading files to Access Policy Manager for Portal Access

You upload files to Access Policy Manager to provide content for a Portal Access webtop link.
Before you upload multiple files to Access Policy Manager, you can combine the files in a ZIP archive format. Then, you can upload and extract the files in one step. In this example, four files are uploaded as a single ZIP archive, called
test.zip
.
  1. On the Main tab, click
    Access
    Webtops
    Hosted Content
    Manage Files
    .
    The Manage Files screen opens.
  2. Click the
    Upload
    button.
    The Create New File popup screen opens.
  3. Under
    Select File
    , click the
    Browse
    button. Browse and select
    test.zip
    .
    The
    Select File
    and
    File Name
    fields are populated with the file name.
  4. In the
    File Destination Folder
    field, specify the folder path
    /test
    in which to place the file.
  5. From the
    File Action
    list, select
    Upload and Extract
    .
  6. Click the
    OK
    button.
    The files appear in the hosted content list, in the folder specified. Any files in subfolders in the archive file also appear in subfolders in the hosted content list.
You must associate any access profiles that will access hosted content with the hosted content repository.

Associating hosted content with access profiles

A user can access hosted content that is associated with that user's access profile. Each access profile that requires hosted content access must be associated with the entire hosted content repository.
  1. On the Main tab, click
    Access
    Webtops
    Hosted Content
    Manage Files
    .
    The Manage Files screen opens.
  2. On the
    Upload
    button, click the right-side arrow to select
    Manage Access
    from the list.
    The Access Settings popup screen opens.
  3. Select the access profiles to associate with hosted content, then click
    OK
    .
    A user must belong to an associated access profile to access hosted content.
View the hosted content list and verify that the access policy association was successful.

Creating a portal access configuration with hosted content

  1. On the Main tab, click
    Access
    Connectivity / VPN
    Portal Access
    Portal Access Lists
    .
    The Portal Access List screen opens.
  2. Click the
    Create
    button.
    The New Resource screen opens.
  3. Type the name and an optional description.
  4. From the
    ACL Order
    list, specify the placement for the resource.
    Option
    Description
    Last
    Select this option to place the new portal access resource last in the ACL list.
    After
    Select this option to select, from the list of configured ACLs, the ACL that this portal access resource should follow in sequence.
    Specify
    Select this option to specify an order number, for example,
    0
    or
    631
    for the ACL.
  5. From
    Configuration
    , select
    Basic
    or
    Advanced
    .
    The
    Advanced
    option provides additional settings so you can configure a proxy host and port.
  6. For the
    Match Case for Paths
    setting, select
    Yes
    to specify that portal access matches alphabetic case when matching paths in the portal access resource.
  7. From the
    Patching Type
    list, select the patching type for the web application.
    For both full and minimal patching types, you can select or clear patching methods specific to your selection.
  8. If you selected
    Minimal Patching
    and the
    Host Patching
    option, type a host search string, or multiple host search strings separated with spaces, and the host replace string, which must be the Access Policy Manager virtual server IP address or fully qualified domain name.
  9. Select the
    Publish on Webtop
    check box.
  10. From the
    Link Type
    list, select
    Hosted Content
    .
  11. From the
    Hosted File
    list, select
    public/share/test/index.html
    .
    This is the filename for this example scenario only. Please select the correct file for your own configuration.
  12. In the Customization Settings for English area, in the
    Caption
    field, type a caption.
    The caption appears on the full webtop, and is required. This field is required even if you do not select the
    Publish on webtop
    option.
  13. Optionally, in the
    Detailed Description
    field type a description for the web application.
  14. In the
    Image
    field, specify an icon for the web application link. Click the
    View/Hide
    link to show the current icon.
  15. If your application is behind a proxy server, to specify a proxy host and port, you must select
    Advanced
    for the configuration to display additional fields, and type the proxy host and proxy port.
  16. Click the
    Create
    button.
    The Portal Access resource is saved, and the Portal Access Resource screen now shows a
    Resource Items
    area.
This completes the portal access resource configuration.
Specify all hosted content files used by this example (all files in the
/test
folder) as resource items.

Creating a portal access resource item for hosted content

You create a portal access resource item in order for hosted content to add a file that is part of a portal access hosted content resource. For example, you might add image files, CSS files, or scripts that are required by the web page or application. You typically use resource items to refine the behavior for web application directories; for example, you might specify
No Compression
and a
Cache All
caching policy for the images for a portal access resource.
You must add (separately) each hosted file used by the portal access resource, and the resource file itself, as resource items.
  1. On the Main tab, click
    Access
    Connectivity / VPN
    Portal Access
    Portal Access Lists
    .
    The Portal Access List screen opens.
  2. Click the name of a portal access resource.
    The Portal Access Properties screen for that resource opens.
  3. In the Resource Items area, click the
    Add
    button.
    A New Resource Item screen for that resource opens.
  4. Select that the resource item type is
    Hosted Content
    .
  5. From the
    Hosted File
    list, select the file to specify as a resource item.
    For purposes of this example, specify
    public/share/test/index.html
    ,
    public/share/test/test_image.jpg
    ,
    public/share/test/style.css
    , and
    public/share/test/js/script.js
    .
  6. Configure the properties for the resource item.
    • To add headers, select
      Advanced
      next to New Resource Item.
    • To configure
      Session Update
      ,
      Session Timeout
      , and
      Home Tab
      , select
      Advanced
      next to Resource Item Properties.
  7. Click
    Finished
    .
    This creates the portal access resource item.