Publishing Office Web Apps Server in Lync Server 2013 using a reverse proxy server

 

Topic Last Modified: 2013-02-25

If you want external users (that is, users logging on from outside your organization’s firewall) to have access to Office Web Apps Server PowerPoint presentations then you will need to use Office Web Apps Server and a reverse proxy server such as Microsoft Forefront Threat Management Gateway. That also means that you will need to create and configure a website publishing rule; that rule will help ensure that users are able to connect to the server. If you do not need to provide access to external users then you do not need to configure a website publishing rule.

To configure a website publishing rule in Forefront Threat Management Gateway complete the following procedure:

  1. Click Start, click All Programs, click Microsoft Forefront TMG, and then click Forefront TMG Management.

  2. In Forefront TMG, right-click Firewall Policy, point to New, and then click Web Site Publishing Rule.

  3. In the New Web Publishing Rule Wizard, on the Welcome to the New Web Publishing Rule Wizard page, type a name for your new rule in the Web publishing rule name box (for example, Office Web Apps Server Rule) and then click Next.

  4. On the Specify Rule Action page, select Allow and then click Next.

  5. On the Publishing Type page, select Publish a single Web site or load balancer and then click Next.

  6. On the Server Connection Security page, select Use SSL to connect to the published Web server or server farm and then click Next.

  7. On the Internal Publishing Details page, type the FQDN of your Office Web Apps server (for example, officewebapps01.contoso.com) in the Internal site name box and then click Next. The name entered in the Internal site name box must appear in the Subject field or the Subject Alternative Name field of the certificate you have assigned to Office Web Apps Server.

  8. On the Internal Publishing Details page, type /* in the Path (optional) box and then click Next. The /* syntax will help ensure that all the folders and subfolders for the site are published.

  9. On the Public Name Details page, select This domain name (type below) from the Accept requests for drop-down list and then type the fully qualified for your Office Web Apps Server in the Public name box. This name should be the name used to access your website. For example, if your site is accessed using the URL http://officewebapps01.contoso.com then you should enter officewebapps01.contoso.com in the Public name box.

  10. Click Next.

  11. On the Select Web Listener page, click New.

  12. In the New Web Listener Definition Wizard, type a name for the new Web listener (for example, SSL) in the Web listener name box and then click Next.

  13. On the Client Connection Security page, select Require SSL secured connections with clients and then click Next.

  14. On the Web Listener IP Addresses page, select External, select Internal, and then click Next.

  15. On the Listener SSL Certificates page, select Use a single certificate for this Web Listener and then click Select Certificate.

  16. In the Select Certificate dialog box, select the certificate to be used for this Web Listener and then click Select.

  17. On the Listener SSL Certificates page, click Next.

  18. On the Authentication Settings page, select No Authentication from the Select how clients will provide credentials to Forefront TMG drop-down list, and then click Next.

  19. On the Single Sign On Settings page, click Next.

  20. On the Completing the New Web Listener Wizard page, review the summary of the configuration choices you have made. When ready, click Finish.

  21. On the Select Web Listener page, click Next.

  22. On the Authentication Delegation page, select No delegation, but client may authenticate directly from the Select the method used by Forefront TMG to authenticate to the published Web server drop-down list and then click Next.

  23. On the User Sets page, confirm that the appropriate user sets are listed. By default, this is the All Users user set. Click Add to add other user sets you may have defined. When complete, click Next.

  24. On the Completing the New Web Publishing Rule Wizard page, click Finish.

Note that clicking Finish does not mean that you completed the process; that is, this does not automatically apply and enable the new rule. Instead, you will need to click the Apply button that will appear in the Forefront TMG user interface. When you click Apply the Configuration Change Description dialog box will appear. Click Apply in that dialog box to enable the new publishing rule.

After your new rule has been applied, you will then need to make some minor modifications to the rule to make sure that users can use the new PowerPoint presentation capabilities. To do that, complete the following procedure:

  1. In Forefront TMG, right-click the name of the new publishing rule and then click Properties.

  2. In the Properties dialog box, on the To tab, select the option Forward the original host header instead of the actual one.

  3. On the Traffic tab, click Filtering and then click Configure HTTP.

  4. In the Configuring HTTP policy for rule dialog box, clear the Verify normalization check box and then click OK.

  5. In the Properties dialog box, click OK.

  6. In Forefront TMG, click Apply to enable the changes. When the Configuration Change Description dialog box appears, click Apply.

After completing the installation you can test your Office Web Apps Server using the procedures in the topic Validating the configuration of Office Web Apps Server in Lync Server 2013.