How to setup a Public site on Enterprise portal in AX2012

The public site is a custom site collection deployed/created on top of regular SharePoint app (Sharepoin-80) that we configure while installing EP on AX2012. This post will list down steps to setup a public site.

Pre-Requisites:

1. The SharePoint foundation 2010 or 2013 has already been installed and configured on the box.
2. The regular EP site must be installed and deployed. (refer to TechNet article for EP installation)

Public Site Creation in SharePoint 2010/2013

1. Launch SharePoint Central Administration
2. Under Application Management, click Manage web applications
3. Select the Web Application hosting the public site. It is SharePoint – 80 in our case.
4. Click Authentication Providers button from the ribbon
5. Click the Default Zone
6. Under Anonymous Access, make sure Enable anonymous access check box is unchecked (required for EP Public Site Creation)
7. Click Save
8. Under Application Management, click Create Site Collections
9. On the following page, enter page Title as EP Public Site (or any meaningful name)
10. Set Web Site Address URL as Public (or anything meaningful)
11. SP2013 ONLY: Select 2010 from ‘Select experience version’ drop down
12. Select Microsoft Dynamics Public template under Custom tab
13. Set Primary Site Collection Administrator as your alias
14. Press OK

After the site has successfully been created, click on the site URL to verify that you can access it

Configure IIS

1. Open Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager (Start > Administrative Tools > Internet Information Services Manager).
2. Select the Web Site SharePoint-80
3. Double click on Authentication
4. Enable Anonymous Authentication (if not already)
5. Enable Windows Authentication (if not already)

Enable Guest Account in AX

1. From the Microsoft Dynamics AX client, click System Administration > Common -> Users -> Users.
2. Double click the Guest User
3. Click on Edit
4. Select the Enabled check box.
5. Assign Guest user to Vendor anonymous (external) role. (note: needed to expose vendor portal on Public site, you can add more external roles as needed)

Configuring SharePoint

1. Launch SharePoint Central Administration
2. Under Application Management, click Manage web applications
3. Select Web Application hosting the public site. It is SharePoint – 80 in our case.
4. Click Authentication Providers button from the ribbon
5. Click the Default Zone
6. Under Anonymous Access, check Enable anonymous access (if not already)
7. Click Save
8. Now go to the EP Public site http://<host_name>/sites/Public
9. Click Sign In to login using system account
10. Navigate to Menu Site Actions > Site Permission
11. From the Ribbon click Anonymous Access button
12. In the popup dialog, select Entire Web site and click OK
13. 13.Launch SharePoint Central Administration
14. Click Application Management > Web Applications > Configure alternate Access Mapping
15. Click Add Internal URLs
16. Choose Alternate Access Mapping collection to be the Web application Sharepoint-80
17. Type http://localhost as the internal URL and Zone =Default.
18. 18.   Click Save

Setup Internet Explorer for anonymous access

To ensure that you are accessing the page in anonymous access mode and not automatically logged in using Windows authentication:

1. In Internet Explorer, Go to Tools > Internet Options > Security tab
2. Select the Trusted zone
3. Click on Custom Level
4. Scroll to the bottom, under User Authentication > Login
5. Select Anonymous logon.
6. Click OK 

Now you should be able to access your public site at the URL  http://<host_name>/sites/Public