For more information on the prerequisites and deployment of the portal, see SAP ServiceMarketplace on service.sap.com/installNW2004s ® Technical Infrastructure Guide - SAP NetWeaver 2004s.
You can scale the portal by increasing the JAVA instances in either a single machine, or over several machines. Either way, you can implement a load-balancing solution that enables the portal to handle a large number of users.
Although, you can install the JAVA instance, and the portal on the same machine as the database, it is recommended to locate them on a machine other than those dedicated to the database, and the user persistence store.
First, install the JAVA instance of the SAP Web Application Server, which installs the Central Services, and then deploy the portal on the same machine.
After, perform the relevant post installations and configurations before installing and configuring additional JAVA instances of the SAP Web Application Server on each machine you intend to use in the cluster.
You can configure the JAVA instance to optimize performance of the newly deployed portal landscape using the template configuration tool.
For more information about configuring the JAVA instance, see J2EE Engine Configuration.
You manage the portal cluster through the SAP Web Application Server, which administers and runs a set of portal servers and their shared resources as though they are on a single machine.
For detailed information, see Java Cluster Architecture.
You can make the portal highly available, and enhance its performance using only the JAVA instance of the SAP Web Application Server.
The JAVA cluster includes the following:
· High Availability and Reliability
You can vertically scale the server process of J2EE engine in a single machine. In addition, you can implement the same scaling configuration for each physical machine in the cluster. This implementation ensures availability at all times.
When a server process is down, the dispatcher node only redirects client requests to other server processes as the portal is always started on all the processes.
Detailed information about identifying and removing single points of failure (SPOFs) in SAP Web Application Server (JAVA), see High Availability and Failover.
· Performance and Scalability
The J2EE engine is scalable across multiple servers and allows load-balancing, that is, you can add extra machines with additional portal installations to the existing cluster environment, as the use of the portal increases.
For more information on the infrastructure of SAP Web Application Server, see SAP Service Marketplace on service.sap.com/installNW2004s ®Technical Infrastructure Guide - SAP NetWeaver 2004s.
Highly available SAP Enterprise Portal can be implemented behind a firewall to provide increased security while processing client requests. In this case, you deploy a reverse proxy server that obtains requests from portal clients and forwards them to the portal. Responses from the portal also go through the reverse proxy server, which delivers them to the clients.
When building your portal landscape, keep in mind the following portal requirements:
· The different elements of the persistence layer, such as the database for the SAP Web Application Server and the portal, and the User Persistence Store. These can be distributed among several machines.
· Firewalls must allow access according to the network connections and landscape.
· The portal must have a single HTTP/HTTPS entry point.
The following illustrates the production environment of a highly available SAP NetWeaver Portal in a firewall:
The system administrator must configure the firewall in accordance with the necessary free ports for the corresponding services, such as HTTP(s), and so on.
The following are the ports to open in the inner firewall:
Component |
Service Name |
Port |
Protocol |
LDAP directory service The connection between the portal and the LDAP directory service can also use SSL.. |
Lightweight Directory Access Protocol |
389
Default SSL port is 636 |
TCP |
Microsoft SQL Server |
MSSQL Server |
1433
For SSL you may use 1434 |
TCP |
Oracle database server |
Listener |
1521 For SSL you may use 1527 |
Oracle service |
Web Publishing – HTTP |
HTTP |
80 |
HTTP |
Web Publishing –HTTPS |
HTTPS |
443 |
HTTPS |
Portal - HTTP |
HTTP |
50000 |
HTTP |
Portal - HTTPs |
HTTPs |
50001 |
HTTPs |
Note that these are the default port numbers used for the specified component, however, they can be changed according to the customers’ network topology. If a port cannot be opened for a component in the inner firewall, that component can be moved to the DMZ as well.
For additional information about the portal security, refer to the Portal Security Guide.