Deploying SAP Web Dispatcher - Amazon Launch Wizard
Architectures for SAP Web DispatcherPost-deployment configuration activities
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Deploying SAP Web Dispatcher

Amazon Launch Wizard supports the deployment of SAP Web Dispatcher as an optional component for Netweaver stack on HANA deployments. SAP Web Dispatcher is deployed in front of your SAP Application Servers to act as the entry point for HTTP(S) request traffic destined for your SAP Application Servers. SAP Web Dispatcher accepts or rejects the request traffic that arrives. Accepted traffic is load balanced among your Application Servers. You can use SAP Web Dispatcher in systems with the following application stacks:

  • Advanced Business Application Programming (ABAP) only

  • Java only

  • ABAP and Java (dual-stack)

Architectures for SAP Web Dispatcher

SAP Web Dispatcher is available for singe instance, multiple instance, and high availability deployments of Netweaver stack on HANA. The deployment type you specify affects the placement of the component in your architecture.

Launch Wizard deploys the component as a standalone component on the same instance where the SAP application and database are deployed.

The following diagram depicts an SAP Web Dispatcher deployment using a single instance.

A SAP Web Dispatcher deployment that uses a single instance.

Launch Wizard deploys the component on a separate instance in the same Availability Zone (AZ) where the SAP application and database components are deployed.

The following diagram depicts an SAP Web Dispatcher deployment using a multiple instances.

A SAP Web Dispatcher deployment that uses multiple instances.

Launch Wizard deploys the component on two Amazon EC2 instances, each in a different Availability Zone (AZ). Each AZ also the SAP application and database components. For more information, see High Availability of the SAP Web Dispatcher in the SAP documentation.

The following diagram depicts a highly available SAP Web Dispatcher deployment using multiple instances behind an internet-facing load balancer.

A SAP Web Dispatcher deployment that is highly available and accessible from the internet.

The following diagrams depicts a highly available SAP Web Dispatcher deployment using multiple instances behind an intranet-facing load balancer.

A SAP Web Dispatcher deployment that is highly available and accessible from your intranet.

Load balancers for SAP Web Dispatcher

You can optionally deploy an Application Load Balancer or Network Load Balancer with all deployment patterns. The load balancer can be used to accept internet or intranet traffic based on your application requirements. For more information about Elastic Load Balancing, see What is Elastic Load Balancing? in the Elastic Load Balancing User Guide.

Network Load Balancer operate at the TCP layer and can handle traffic such as the RFC protocol for system interfaces and File Transfer Protocol (FTP). If your applications need additional context such as HTTP headers, or you plan to integrate other Amazon services in your architecture, consider using an Application Load Balancer. Deploying an Application Load Balancer allows you to integrate various other services such as Amazon WAF, Amazon Certificate Manager (ACM), and Amazon CloudFormation.

In Launch Wizard, you will have the option to implement the SSL/TLS termination at load balancer. You must first request a public SSL in ACM or import your own SSL Certificate into ACM to use this option. If you need to do end-to-end HTTPS encryption, you can follow the post-deployment configuration activities. For more information on configuring your deployed resources to support HTTS traffic, see Post-deployment configuration activities.

Post-deployment configuration activities

After your Launch Wizard for SAP deployment with the SAP Web Dispatcher component completes, you must perform several manual configurations to finalize the deployment. These additional configurations are in the customer portion of the Amazon Shared Responsibility Model. You should ensure that the changes you make meet your specific security requirements.

Validate HTTP(S) listeners are set up

HTTP(S) listeners must be set up in the SAP System. You can check whether the Internet Communication Framework (ICF) is configured according to your requirements (transaction SMICM for ABAP). All HTTP(S) listeners must use the correct port settings and be in the Active status. For more information, see Displaying and Changing Services in the SAP documentation.

Activate HTTP(S) services

For SAP Web Dispatcher and load balancing to function properly, you must activate the following services in the HTTP service tree (transaction SICF for ABAP):

  • /sap/public/icman

  • /sap/public/icf_info/*

  • /sap/public/ping

For ABAP installations, you must activate /sap/public/ping to allow load balancers to perform health checks through SAP Web Dispatcher. This prevents the routing of traffic to unhealthy application servers.

For Java installations, you must use /startPage as the starting point for the health check endpoint. Once you have full installed and configured the Portal Usage Type, you can adjust this value to /irj/portal.

For more information, see Operating SAP Web Dispatcher in the SAP documentation.

Validate target group checks are set up

After you configure load balancing, the target group for your load balancer might end up with unhealthy SAP Web Dispatcher endpoints. You can reregister your SAP Web Dispatcher instances with the correct ports to ensure the load balancer is properly routing traffic. For more information, see Register or deregister targets in the Elastic Load Balancing User Guide.

Validate SAP Web Dispatcher functionality

After you configure and validate the related SICF services and validate that the load balancer target groups are healthy, you can validate SAP Web Dispatcher with a web browser.

To access SAP Web Dispatcher

  1. Open a web browser on a device that can access the instance running SAP Web Dispatcher.

  2. Access your SAP Web Dispatcher web console, replacing values as necessary:

    http://load-balancer-dns-endpoint:listener-port/sap/wdisp/admin/public/default.html

  3. For user, enter webadm.

  4. For password, enter the password you specified in the Launch Wizard deployment.

  5. Login to the web console.

  6. Choose Monitor Application Servers and ensure that you can see all of your Application Servers and that they are using port 80.

  7. Choose Monitor Server Groups and ensure that you can see all of your server groups.

    For more information, see Area Menu in the SAP documentation.

Enable HTTPS communication

To provide you with the most flexibility to meet your own requirements, SAP Web Dispatcher is deployed behind an Application Load Balancer with only the HTTP protocol enabled by default. Launch Wizard can implement SSL/TLS termination at the load balancer during deployment, or you can implement end-to-end encryption after the deployment completes.

With SSL/TLS termination, HTTPS traffic from the end user is decrypted at the load balancer. This traffic is then forwarded to SAP Web Dispatcher and your application servers using the HTTP protocol. Launch Wizard can configure SSL/TLS termination at the load balancer during deployment. To use this option, you will need to specify a load balancer and ACM certificate while configuring the deployment. For more information, see Deploy an SAP application with Amazon Launch Wizard.

With end-to-end HTTPS encryption, traffic is encrypted to the load balancer and then traffic is re-encrypted at the SAP Web Dispatcher and Application Server instances. You must obtain a certificate from a 3rd party provider before following this procedure.

To configure end-to-end encryption

  1. Apply your own certificate to your application servers.

    1. If you have a SAP ABAP application server, apply your certificate to it. For more information, see Configuring the ABAP Platform to Support TLS in the SAP documentation.

    2. If you have a SAP NetWeaver Java application server, apply your certificate to it. For more information, see Configuring Transport Layer Security on SAP NetWeaver AS for Java in the SAP documentation.

  2. Apply your own certificate to the SAP Web Dispatcher instance. For more information, see Configure SAP Web Dispatcher to Support SSL in the SAP documentation.

  3. Import the certificate that you used in the previous steps into ACM. For more information, see Importing a certificate in the Amazon Certificate Manager User Guide.

  4. Create a listener for your Load Balancer.

    1. If you use Application Load Balancer, you create a HTTPS listener with your certificate imported into ACM as the default certificate. For more information, see Create an HTTPS listener for your Application Load Balancer in the User Guide for Application Load Balancers.

    2. If you use Network Load Balancer, you create a TLS Listener. For more information, see TLS listeners for your Network Load Balancer in User Guide for Network Load Balancers.

  5. Configure an alias or CNAME DNS record for your load balancer using your preferred domain name. For example, your domain name might resemble the following:

    example.yourdomain.com

    1. If you use Amazon Route 53, create an Alias record. For more information, see Creating records by using the Amazon Route 53 console in the Amazon Route 53 Developer Guide.

    2. If you use a different DNS provider, create a CNAME record with the provider. For more information, refer to your DNS provider’s documentation.

  6. Confirm the configuration is working by accessing your endpoint by the DNS name over HTTPS.

    1. For ABAP systems, your URL with the custom DNS name might resemble the following:

      https://example.yourdomain.com/sap/public/ping

    2. For Java systems, your URL with the custom DNS name might resemble the following:

      https://example.yourdomain.com/startPage