KM search iView does not work correctly in External Facing Portal

Symptom

• KM iview (e.g search function in Portal masterhead) does not work correctly when the portal is used as External Facing Portal (EFP).
• The search URL is different from the URL through non-external accessing, like:
  irj/portal/servlet... - EFP
  irj/servlet... - non-external
• Authentication screen appears.
  

Environment

SAP NetWeaver Java

Reproducing the Issue

1. Portal was configured external.
2. Users access from Portal from external. (e.g a anonymous user access portal from internet)
3. Execute search function in masterhead.
4. Authenticate screen appears.
   

Cause

• In External Facing Portal, all iViews are embedded which will create a plain html without IFRAMES or FRAMES.
  So all the link, buttons, events and navigation performed in this EFP portal will be reflected in the browser URL.
• The search label in masthead area is a reference to the search iView and therefore when the customer clicks on it the result is a URL.
  Basically it is a href or action to a navigation target (in general all the navigations in EFP trigger this kind of URLs.)
• However the KM iView is htmlb based, it is not EFP compatible and the search button is a htmlb component that triggers a server event. This event is passed to the server with a URL similar to this URL:
  [http://ep.app.com.cn:50000/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/pcd!
  3aportal_content!2fevery_user!2fgeneral!2feu_role!2fcom.sap.km.home_ws!
  2fcom.sap.km.hidden!2fcom.sap.km.urlaccess!2fcom.sap.km.basicsearch?
  layoutSetMode=exclusive&ResourceListType=com.sapportals.wcm.SearchResult
  List&SearchType=quick&QueryString=test]
  There are a bunch of parameters processing in the server and according to them the portal is refreshed, the navigation is performed.
  

Resolution

• User has to create own search iview which uses standard html components.
• Make this html elements call KM search.