How do I make my Ebase forms live on our web site?

[Vanessa]

Question:
How do I make my Ebase forms live on our web site? When I put the URL to the form on our website, it does not link to the forms.

Answer:
You should have a Web Server installed and we recommend installing a Redirector that will redirect external http requests from the internet to Tomcat. This will effectively eliminate the port number from the URL.

If you have access to - and can make modifications to - the server that serves your website, then you need to know which web server it is running. We only have experience configuring Tomcat with IIS or Apache Web Server.

The following explains how the forms are made available online:

The system setup we normally recommend is as follows:

The web server (Apache/IIS) is installed on a server in the DMZ: This machine is protected by an external Firewall, on which port 80 (the default port) is open (and/or 443 for SSL). Http requests such as http://www.abc.gov.uk come through port 80 on this machine.

Tomcat (Ebase) is installed on another server (different physical machine) in the intranet. This machine is protected by an internal Firewall, on which port 8009 is open. This is the only port that Tomcat requires. The live Ebase environment is running on this server, e.g. a complaint form. When running forms within the intranet, they are available via http://your.internal.server.gov.uk:3031 ... formid=XYZ

The Redirector is installed within the DMZ. Once the Redirector is installed and configured as per the instructions, it will recognize the contents of a URL and redirect the request from the Internet through the internal Firewall through port 8009 (by default) to Tomcat which is running on the intranet. Therefore, the URL you have to place on your website will be something like

http://www.abc.gov.uk/ufs_live/ufsmain?formid=FORM_NAME.

The redirector recognizes the 'ufs_live' in the URL and redirects the request to Tomcat as explained above. (NOTE: The form name MUST be in uppercase in the URL)

The only thing the above does is set up a 'link' between the internet > web server > Tomcat, but there are also different ways in which you can setup Ebase (more securely) within the internal Firewall (intranet).

You can run two Ebase applications within one Tomcat, i.e. two web applications (ufs_live and ufs_dev) within the Webapps folder in Tomcat.

You can also run two separate Tomcats on the same server so that production (ufs_live) and development (ufs_dev) are entirely separate.

Although it is possible to run Ebase like this, the most secure setup would be to run the development and production environments and the respective databases on separate servers. The way you set up Ebase to run within the Intranet does not significantly affect the way in which you install and configure IIS/Apache Redirectors.

[nftfi]

Do you have any advice for making ebase forms live if you have placed the server in the DMZ?

Thanks

[Vanessa]

We don't have advice on installing Ebase in the DMZ as we don't recommend that you place your Ebase forms (Tomcat) in the DMZ. This kind of setup can result in database connection problems and it is also less secure than serving your Ebase forms behind your internal firewall. If someone manages to get through your external firewall, your live forms would be exposed.

Our recommendation is to keep Ebase behind your internal firewall and install a redirector in the DMZ to redirect web requests to Tomcat as explained above.