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Using ASP.NET Forms with ARCHIBUS Web Central Running Tomcat

Rather than take advantage of ARCHIBUS's features for customizing rich-interface views, many  Microsoft .Net sites prefer to work in the familiar .Net environment and develop ASP.NET forms. They can then integrate these into ARCHIBUS Web Central

These users can launch their own custom Web forms from within Web Central using all the rich client features available with ASP.NET. The ASP.NET forms can edit data, perform calculations and updates, and produce reports -- all using a live connection to the database so the data is always up-to-the-minute.  

A key advantage to using the ARCHIBUS Web Central Process Navigator to launch ASP.NET forms is that the process, role, group, and Hot List security that you have established within Web Central affect the visibility and accessibility of the tasks that launch ASP.NET forms: if users do not have access, they will not see or be able to launch the form from the Process Navigator.

Configuration

Following are the components involved in setting up Web Central to use ASP.NET applications and forms.

Note: Communication between the Web server and Tomcat is through the Apache Tomcat Connector (JK), which is an ISAPI filter that can be configured in IIS.

Normally, IIS cannot execute Servlets and Java Server Pages (JSPs); however, the Apache Tomcat Connector (JK) instructs IIS to redirect Servlet and JSP requests.

The Apache Tomcat Connector (JK) only supports Apache Tomcat.

Step 1: Configure Tomcat and IIS

See the instructions in Configuring the SSO (Preauth) Authentication Use Case.

Step 2: Configure ARCHIBUS Web Central

Modify the absoluteAppPath attribute from the default:

• http://localhost:8080/#Attribute%//@webAppDirectory%

to

• http://localhost/#Attribute%//@webAppDirectory% where the local host points to the name/location where IIS resides.

Step 3: Integrate your ASP.NET Applications

Create ASP.NET Applications

Use VisualStudio.NET to create the ASP.NET applications. A sample project is provided with ARCHIBUS Install program and is located in C:\Program Files\Afmxx\tools\tomcat\ASP.NET\Source

Deploy ASP.NET Applications

To deploy ASP.NET applications:

• Launch Internet Service Manager.
• Stop the Web site if it is running.
• Create a virtual directory by clicking on the default web site.

• Type the alias to say �archibus�, press Next
• Set the directory to where your ASP.NET forms (.aspx files) reside, such as, C:\Program Files\Afmxx\tools\tomcat\ASP.NET
• Make sure that the compiled ASP.NET application (dll) resides in the bin folder one level below the .aspx files, such as, C:\Program Files\Afmxx\tools\tomcat\ASP.NET \bin

Assign ASP.NET Forms to ARCHIBUS Web Central Tasks

Once a completely tested ASP.NET form is available, assign this .aspx form to a process in the ARCHIBUS Process Tasks (afm_ptasks) table by entering the file name in the Task File field, just as you would enter an .axvw file. This form can be then accessed when the user chooses this task from the ARCHIBUS Web Central Process Navigator.

Troubleshooting

• Make sure that the ISAPI filter is loaded. It should have a green arrow alongside it. If it is not loaded, restart IIS.
• In case of errors, change the log _level from �emerg� to �trace� to see the trace of all the http transactions.
• Make sure that the .NET provider for the database server is in the same location as the .NET web application (dll).
• Test the web application thoroughly before deploying it.