Managing Anonymous Access to a Site


In certain situations, an organization might want to open a SharePoint site up to anonymous access from the Internet or from other networks. Obviously, some security concerns must be worked through with this, but assuming these concerns have been addressed, two specific tasks must be performed to enable this type of access.

First and foremost, anonymous access must be enabled on a Virtual Server level for the Portal or Windows SharePoint Services site collection. In many cases, you as a Site Administrator may not have access to this, so you may have to send the request up to the Portal Administrator. If you do, you must allow anonymous access from Internet Information Services Manager for the Virtual Server on which SharePoint is installed.

Once anonymous access has been turned on at the Virtual Server level, the various Site Administrators can then decide whether they want to enable anonymous access for their particular site. If you want to set it up, follow these steps:

1.

From the site home page, click on Site Settings.

2.

Click Go to Site Administration.

3.

Click Manage Anonymous Access.

4.

On the next screen, shown in Figure 16.5, select what type of access anonymous users should have.

Figure 16.5. Allowing anonymous access.


5.

Click OK to verify these settings.

6.

In addition, you can define whether all authenticated users on your network can access the site. This can be useful if you want everyone in your company to be a Reader, for example.

7.

Click OK.

Anonymous access can make your life easier by removing the need to specifically define all users who can access a site. You should note, however, that great care must be taken when determining whether to turn on this setting, especially if the SharePoint server is exposed to the Internet, because your sensitive information can be easily exposed to snoops and exploits.



    Sams Teach Yourself Microsoft SharePoint 2003 in 10 Minutes
    Sams Teach Yourself Microsoft SharePoint 2003 in 10 Minutes
    ISBN: 672327236
    EAN: N/A
    Year: 2004
    Pages: 181

    flylib.com © 2008-2017.
    If you may any questions please contact us: flylib@qtcs.net