Tuesday, May 20

External-Facing Portal (NW04)

Symptom
This note is intended as a central entry point for all information and notes (consulting and bug fixes) related to the implementation of SAP NetWeaver Portal 2004 as an external-facing portal.
Reason and Prerequisites
The features for implementing an external-facing portal were introduced in SAP NetWeaver 2004 SPS14.
Solution
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I GENERAL INFORMATION
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Implementing an external-facing portal extends the capabilities of the SAP NetWeaver Portal by enabling large companies to provide information, services and applications to customers, vendors and partners in a public web portal that performs well over the Internet and operates in a manner similar to standard, customizable web sites.

To enable and ease the implementation of a Web portal, the SAP NetWeaver Portal includes tools for creating an external-facing portal. The portal offers support of standard Web-like behavior, quickly putting casual and first-time portal visitors at ease. It provides the means for customizing the portal look and feel to provide a fresh and updated Web site look for a public audience. And it reduces the number of resources transmitted over the web, increasing the performance for Internet users, which is especially important for users who access the portal over low-bandwidth connections and dial-up networks.

Although not always appropriate for certain applications that require a large number of resources and support of the SAP NetWeaver client framework, an external-facing portal using the SAP NetWeaver Portal can help companies boost their portal project ROI by using the same platform for the company's Internet and Intranet implementations.

For more information, see the external-facing portal documentation on the Help Portal at http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04/helpdata/en/04/e5b7c3de384515afeafa0dab8e44e0/frameset.htm.

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II LIMITATIONS
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For information on any portal limitations in SAP Netweaver 2004, including any limitations on implementing an external-facing portal, see SAP Note 709354.

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III RESTRICTIONS
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The following are restrictions when implementing an external-facing portal:
  • Session Termination Not Supported: Applications that use the EPCM's session termination feature may not work properly. The feature enables applications to sign up to be notified if the user tries to exit the application or the portal, in order for the application to save data or take other steps.
  • WorkProtect Mode Not Supported: Applications that use the EPCM's WorkProtect Mode feature may not work properly. The feature automatically tracks whether data entered into an application was saved and, if the user tries to navigate to another location, either displays a dialog for saving the data or opens the new page in a new window.
  • Unsupported Content: The following content makes use of the Session Termination or WorkProtect Mode and, therefore, is not supported in an external-facing portal:
    • Web Dynpro applications
    • SAP business packages
    • SAP transactional iViews
  • Knowledge Management (KM) Restrictions: For more information on restrictions on the use of KM within an external-facing portal, see SAP Note 709354.
  • Related Links and Dynamic Navigation Not Supported
    • Related Links: The Related Links iView uses HTMLB and EPCM, so any page with a Related Links iView will not be light.
The Related Links iView is not part of the out-of-the-box light framework page, so related links will not be displayed. You can add the iView to the light framework page, in order to display related links, but the external-facing portal will no longer be light.
    • Dynamic Navigation: Any Dynamic Navigation iView that uses HTMLB or EPCM causes pages on which they appear not to be light.
  • Application Integrator: The use of the browser's Back button is not supported when using Application Integrator iViews.
  • Anonymous Users and Hashed URLS: If an anonymous user is the first to navigate to a page in a portal with short URLs, the navigation will fail. For more information, see SAP Note 913367.
  • Named Anonymous Users: There is a general restriction when using named anonymous users in the portal. See SAP Note 870247.
  • Safari/Opera and HTMLB Browsers: Safari and Opera browsers are not supported by HTMLB and, therefore, HTMLB-based iViews are not supported in these browsers, including the following:
    • Portal and page personalization iViews
    • Related Links iView
  • Personalization iViews: Personalization iViews use HTMLB and, therefore, are considered heavy content.
  • Behavior of Light Navigation iViews: The following is a list of special behaviors of light navigation iViews:
    • Navigation Panel: After a user resizes the navigation panel and then navigates to another page, the light navigation panel returns to its default size.
    • Page Title Bar: The light page title bar does not display the name of the current page or iView.
    • Top-Level Navigation iView:There is no hovering option in the light top-level navigation iView.

Posted by Mohammed Bohra at 2:07 AM

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