3 Installing OracleAS Portal

This chapter provides a brief overview of what is installed and configured, by default, in the process of installing OracleAS Portal. For complete instructions on how to install and configure the infrastructure and the middle tier in different topologies, refer to the Oracle Application Server Installation Guide.

This chapter contains the following sections:

What Is Installed and Configured By Default?
Accessing OracleAS Portal After Installation
Configuring OracleAS Portal During and After Installation

If you are planning to upgrade OracleAS Portal from a previous release, you will need to refer to the Upgrade documentation on Portal Center, http://portalcenter.oracle.com/upgrades.

3.1 What Is Installed and Configured By Default?

The Installation of OracleAS Portal consists of two phases:

Oracle Application Server Infrastructure Installation
Oracle Application Server Middle-tier Installation

Oracle Application Server Infrastructure Installation

The OracleAS Infrastructure installation consists of the Oracle Application Server Single Sign-On, Oracle Internet Directory, Oracle Delegated Administration Services, and the Oracle Application Server Metadata Repository.

The OracleAS Metadata Repository component of Oracle Application Server 10g creates a new database and populates it with a collection of schemas used by Oracle Application Server components, such as the OracleAS Portal metadata schema during an infrastructure installation.

If you plan to install the OracleAS Metadata Repository, including the OracleAS Portal schema, in a customer database, you need to run the Oracle Application Server Metadata Repository Creation Assistant tool, available on the OracleAS Metadata Repository Creation Assistant CD-ROM, to populate the existing database with the OracleAS Metadata Repository. You must do this before running the installer to install other Oracle Application Server components. Refer to the Oracle Application Server Installation Guide for more information.

When you install OracleAS Portal, some default database schemas and user accounts are also installed. Refer to Section 6.3.1, "Configuring OracleAS Portal Security Options" in Chapter 6, "Securing OracleAS Portal" for a description of the default database schemas.

Oracle Application Server Middle-tier Installation

During the Oracle Application Server middle-tier installation, OracleAS Portal is configured to use the infrastructure services. The deployment of the portal applications in the middle tier also occurs at this time. The following steps are performed at this time:

OracleAS Portal is added as a partner application to OracleAS Single Sign-On.
OracleAS Web Cache configuration information is stored in the OracleAS Portal schema in the OracleAS Metadata Repository.
User and Group information is created in Oracle Internet Directory.
The Oracle Application Server Provider Group is added to OracleAS Portal.
OracleAS Portal Service Monitoring is configured.
The Provider user interface is configured to work with OracleAS Portal. The middle-tier URL, used to access the provider user interface framework from OracleAS Portal is added to the global settings page.
The default Web providers, OmniPortlet and Web Clipping, are registered.
The Wireless configuration information is configured.
Oracle Text and Oracle Ultra Search are configured.
An entry for OracleAS Portal is created in the Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g targets.xml file.
The configuration file ORACLE_HOME/config/ias.properties is updated.
The OracleAS Portal DAD is created in the configuration file, ORACLE_HOME/Apache/modplsql/conf/dads.conf, using the parameters provided at installation time.
The Portal Dependency Settings file iasconfig.xml is created. See Section A, "Using the Portal Dependency Settings Tool and File" for details.
The file cache.xml is created.

cache.xml stores OracleAS Web Cache invalidation settings and it is used by Web providers such as OmniPortlet and Web Clipping. See Oracle Application Server Portal Developer's Guide for more information.

The details for these steps are available, after the installation, in the file MID_TIER_ORACLE_HOME/assistants/opca/install.log.

Refer to Section 6.1.2.1, "OracleAS Portal Default, Seeded User Accounts" and Section 6.1.2.2, "OracleAS Portal Default, Seeded Groups" for a description of the OracleAS Portal default user accounts and groups.

Out of the box, the initialization parameters for this new database are suitable for a very small OracleAS Portal configuration with few users. If you plan to use OracleAS Portal, it is recommended that you modify the initialization parameters for the database based on the requirements for installing the OracleAS Metadata Repository in an existing database, using the settings specified in the Oracle Application Server Installation Guide. As you make changes in your configuration, you may need to further tune the initialization parameters based on the size of your configuration, and the number of simultaneous users of OracleAS Portal.

3.2 Accessing OracleAS Portal After Installation

This section details the steps you should take to access OracleAS Portal after installation:

After you install Oracle Application Server, go to the Oracle Application Server page at http://hostname.domain:7777 (7777 is the default port number used during installation). Here you can view the documentation library, take the Quick Tour, and run some demos. To run the demos, click the Demonstrations tab and then select Portal and Wireless from the Navigation panel.

Access OracleAS Portal by entering the following URL in your browser:

http://<host>:<port>/pls/<dad>

The Portal Builder page is displayed.

Table 3-1 explains the components that make up the URL used to access OracleAS Portal.

Table 3-1 Portal URL Descriptions

Parameter	Description
`hostname`	Defines the computer on which you installed OracleAS Portal. Enter both the hostname and the fully qualified domain name. For example, enter `host.domain.com`. This name must also match the `ServerName` parameter in the configuration file, `httpd.conf`, located in: `ORACLE_HOME/Apache/Apache/conf`
`port number`	Defines the port number to access OracleAS Portal.
`pls`	Defines the virtual path and indicates that the request is for a PL/SQL procedure. This alerts the Oracle HTTP Server to reroute the request to the OC4J_Portal instance, which provides all the Portal Services. Note: mod_plsql is no longer used by OracleAS Portal in this release. When Oracle HTTP Server receives this virtual path for a portal DAD, mod_rewrite directives in the Oracle HTTP Server configuration route the request to OC4J_Portal, and the PL/SQL procedure request is handled by the Portal Services.
`dad`	Defines the Database Access Descriptor (DAD) you specified earlier for your OracleAS Portal installation. The DAD contains information on how to connect to the database. By default the DAD is 'portal'.

Click the Login link, located in the top right corner as shown in Figure 3-1:

Figure 3-1 Login Link

Description of "Figure 3-1 Login Link"

Note:

OracleAS Portal creates its users in Oracle Internet Directory only once, based on the OracleAS Portal schema in the Application Server Metadata Repository. Subsequent middle-tier installations that use the services of the same portal schema in the Application Server Metadata Repository do not create or update users in Oracle Internet Directory. Therefore, the portal password is the ias_admin password of the first middle tier that uses the services of the Application Server Metadata Repository.

After you have verified that OracleAS Portal is up and running, by logging in, you can run the OracleAS Portal Diagnostic Assistant (PDA) and view the generated reports for additional verification. Refer to Section K.2.5, "Using OracleAS Portal Diagnostics Assistant" for instructions on how to run the PDA.

3.3 Configuring OracleAS Portal During and After Installation

During a middle-tier installation that includes OracleAS Portal, you can specify if you want to configure, and automatically start OracleAS Portal at the end of the installation. If you select that option, Oracle Universal Installer (OUI) will configure OracleAS Portal in two phases:

OracleAS Portal middle-tier deployment
OracleAS Portal schema configuration in the OracleAS Metadata Repository

If you choose not to configure OracleAS Portal, and want to do this later, you need to:

Use Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Application Server Control Console to deploy OracleAS Portal on the middle tier. Refer to Section 7.2.2, "Using Application Server Control Console to Configure OracleAS Portal" for more information.
Use the Portal Dependency Settings file and tool, to perform the OracleAS Portal schema configuration in the OracleAS Metadata Repository. This step is necessary because, when you use Application Server Control console, the OracleAS Metadata Repository is not automatically configured and existing configuration entries on the OracleAS Metadata Repository are overwritten. Refer to Appendix A, "Using the Portal Dependency Settings Tool and File" for more information.

You can update the OracleAS Metadata Repository with any changes made to the Portal Dependency Settings file iasconfig.xml, related to middle-tier component properties, such as OracleAS Web Cache, and Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g.

OracleAS Portal does not support serving two middle tiers from a single repository, unless it is front-ended by a load balancing router (LBR). Refer to Section 5.3, "Configuring Multiple Middle Tiers with a Load Balancing Router" for instructions on how to set up OracleAS Portal with an LBR. If you want to add additional middle tiers to a farm that is already using OracleAS Infrastructure Services, you do not want to overwrite the existing configuration entries during the deployment. In this case, you would install the additional middle tier without configuring OracleAS Portal, then configure OracleAS Portal, using Application Server Control Console, and finally update the Portal Dependency Settings file.

Note:

By default, iasconfig.xml resides in ORACLE_HOME/portal/conf. If the Portal Dependency Settings file is accessible over a network file system, you can share the file across multiple hosts, avoiding the need to manually replicate it every time the file is modified. If the installation is running on an operating system that supports symbolic links, it is recommended that you use this mechanism to reference a shared file. If, however, the Portal Dependency Settings file is not accessible over the network, you must ensure that the file is kept up-to-date with changes to your site topology. Refer to Section A.2.4, "Updating the Portal Dependency Settings File" for more information.

Follow the steps outlined in Section 7.2.2, "Using Application Server Control Console to Configure OracleAS Portal" to use Application Server Control Console to deploy OracleAS Portal on the middle tier.

At this point, your OracleAS Portal middle-tier components are deployed and configured. The DAD has been created, and the Portal Dependency Settings file iasconfig.xml has been updated.

To update the OracleAS Metadata Repository with any changes made to the Portal Dependency Settings file iasconfig.xml, run the script ptlconfig, located in the directory ORACLE_HOME/portal/conf, as follows:

ptlconfig -dad portal

Additional middle tiers are often added to production sites, to improve scalability. The two-phased process described in the preceding text allows the flexibility of adding additional middle tiers, without system downtime.