Chapter 5: Web Console—Web Services

Introduction

The Web console is a J2EE Web application, distributed with EAServer, which allows you to view and manage Web services contained in EAServer.

You can perform many of the same functions described in this chapter using wstool and wstkeytool commands or the WST development tool interface.

Connecting to the Web console

To connect to the Web console, EAServer must be running.

In your Web browser, go to the Web console application located at , where hostname is where EAServer runs.
Enter a user name and password and click Login to connect to the Web console. For complete access use jagadmin as the user name. The default password for jagadmin is blank.

Logging in to the Web console versus logging into Sybase Central

There are some differences you should be aware of regarding logging in to the Web console versus EAServer using Sybase Central:

Sybase Central does not require you to log in. Sybase Central is not hosted in an application server, has no security in and of itself, and stores its information based on operating system authentication information, not a separate authentication system. Sybase Central stores its information related to who the user logged in to the operating system as and what machine you logged in from.
Web console stores its information based on the user logged in to the Web console. This allows you to retain your preferences no matter what machine you logged in from or who you logged in to the operating system as.

If the Web console is hosted in the same server that you want to connect to, you must log in to both the Web console and the server, using, in most cases, the same user name and password. You can, however, mark your server profile as “auto connect” (described in Table 5-1), which means you only need to log in to the Web console, and it automatically logs in to the server.

Web console security and access

The Web console uses Web application security. A user must be created and added to the Admin role to have access to all of the Web console’s features. By default, jagadmin is a member of the Admin role. There is also a role named WebConsole_ReadOnly. Users that belong to this role have read only access to the Web console; changes made to user’s preferences or any profiles are not saved.

Adding an authentication service to EAServer

By default, EAServer does not have a default authentication service installed. Only the jagadmin user is authenticated. Authentication is enabled either by installing a custom authentication service (see html/ir/CtsSecurity__AuthService.html in your EAServer installation directory), or by installing a JAAS login module.

EAServer provides a sample server side JAAS login module. To install the sample JAAS login module in EAServer:

From EAServer Manager, select Server Properties | Security, and set the JAAS configuration file to $JAGUAR/html/classes/Sample/JAAS/jaas.cfg.
Select Server | Advanced | All Properties tab, and if necessary, define a new property com.sybase.jaguar.server.jaas.section. Set the value of this property to UsernamePasswordBased.
Restart the server.

The jaas.cfg file points to your $JAGUAR/html/classes/Sample/JAAS/users.xml file, which contains two users, jagadmin and anonymous. By default, jagadmin is a member of the Admin role and anonymous is a member of the WebConsole_ReadOnly role. If you log in to the Web console as anonymous, and use the password “pwd,” you see that changes made to server profiles, preferences, and so on, persist only for the length of your session (until you log out or the session times out).

Check with your EAServer administrator before making any changes. For more information see the JAAS Web site.

users.xml file

This modified users.xml file illustrates how you can implement authentication using a JAAS login module:

 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?> 
 <user_info policy="MD5">
 <user>
  <name>jagadmin</name> 
   <description>com.sybase.jaguar.server.jaas.section=UsernamePasswordBased
  </description> 
 </user>
 <user>
  <name>anonymous</name> 
  <description /> 
  <password>pwd</password> 
</user>
<user>
  <name>new_user</name> 
  <description /> 
  <password>pwd</password> 
</user>
</user_info>

Disabling JavaScript

You can run the Web console with JavaScript disabled, although the context-sensitive menus require JavaScript. After enabling JavaScript in the browser, log in to the console again.

The wizard functionality of the Web console assumes that JavaScript is enabled. If disabled, there are minor differences in wizard behavior. These differences include:

The context menus do not appear. You must instead use the menu below the tree view.
Combination dialogs do not work.
Wizards and property sheets do not indicate default values.
Wizards are always shown in the right pane, even if the preference is set for pop-up windows.

Browser support

The console runs best with Internet Explorer version 5.5 and higher, Netscape version 7.x and higher, and Mozilla version 1.0 and higher.

Authentication time-out in EAServer

The default EAServer authentication time-out is set to 1 hour or 3600 seconds. If the console remains unused for longer than this, you must log in again. You can adjust the time-out property by modifying the com.sybase.jaguar.server.authtimeout property from EAServer Manager.

Session time-out in EAServer

The default session time-out for the console is to never time-out. The associated properties are:

com.sybase.jaguar.webapplication.session-config.session-timeout
com.sybase.jaguar.webapplication.session-config