SiteMinder Agent for SharePoint Guide › Configure SharePoint › Configure Alternate Access Mapping › Alternate Access Mappings

Alternate Access Mappings

In SharePoint, public URLs are visible to users. Internal URLs identify resources within a particular server or SharePoint server farm. Using alternate access mappings, you can create relationships to between the Public URL and several Internal URLs.

Alternate access mappings create relationships between Public and Internal URLs to perform the following functions:

• Direct users to the correct URLs during their interaction with SharePoint
• Map external requests to the correct web applications and sites within a SharePoint server or server farm.
• Support a SharePoint server or server farm behind a load balancer. The load balancer forwards requests to the Public URL. The SharePoint server uses the alternate access mapping to determine which resources to display for the request.

SharePoint allows each web application to be associated with a collection of mappings between internal and public URLs. The collection of mappings is named a zone.

A zone is a way to map multiple web applications to a single set of content databases. All web applications are initially assigned to the Default zone when first created. You can only assign a different zone when you are extending the web application. Each zone can have a different authentication method.

The five types of zones are as follows:

• Default
• Intranet
• Internet
• Custom
• Extranet

Configure the public URL of the web application zone to the virtual host URL defined in the Agent for SharePoint so the Agent for SharePoint can receive and direct requests to the SharePoint web application.

Before you configure alternate access mapping, note which zone is associated with the Agent for SharePoint. By default, web applications are associated with the default zone which provides Windows Authentication (NTLM).