portal and proxy configuration confusion

[glennhazelton]

hi all,



I am in the process of setting up Portal (10.3) and I have been reading all the
great references to installing the WAB-dev edition. I get most of it but I am a
bit confused by the proxy server option. if  someone could
simply explain when and why I might download and use the proxy it would help me
conceptualize all the moving parts.

we do have an enterprise proxy but I think that must be different.

thank in advance.

glenn

[RobertScheitlin__GISP]

Glenn,

   You will need a Proxy when you have geometry operations like buffer that is attempting to buffer a complex polygon and the string that represents this polygon is longer than the max string length for a http GET and it has to switch to a POST, or you are accessing secure map services and need to provide a username and password behind the scenes and not prompt the user with the identity manager.

[glennhazelton]

Robert,

it sounds like a useful thing to setup in the beginning. it would also mask the source url right?

you mentioned secured services.

I will likely have some but if I use the method you are suggesting won't I be negating the 'security'?

and as an associated question--

what are your feelings etc on 'federating' arcserver vs registering services.

[RobertScheitlin__GISP]

Glenn,

   Yes I would suggest setting up your proxy now and not wait until you have something fail because it need to use http POST instead of GET.

The use of a proxy to provide username and credentials is only a good workflow when you want your Application to have access to the secure resources but not have your user know they are using secure resources (i.e. not have to type a user name and password). The services are still secured in ArcGIS Server and anyone not using your app will get challenged for user name and password. This is only for certain use cases.

I have no experience with federating so I can speak to that.