Web Agent Guides › Web Agent Configuration Guide › Control Inbound URL Processing

Control Inbound URL Processing

This section contains the following topics:

Decode Query Data in a URL

Ignore Query Data in a URL

Query String Encryption of Redirect URLs

Allow Un-restricted Access to URIs

Encrypt Query String Parameters in Redirection URLs

Set a Maximum URL Size

Decode Query Data in a URL

To have the Web Agent’s Base64 algorithm decode a URL’s query data before calling the Policy Server (so the Policy Server sees the proper resource), use the following parameter:

DecodeQueryData

Specifies whether the Web Agent decodes the query data in a URL before calling the Policy Server. Set this parameter to yes if you need do any of the following tasks in your environment:

• If you need to ensure the rules filer acts against the proper string.
• If you need to or write rules against the data in a query string.

Default: No

To have the Web Agent decode the query data in a URL before calling the Policy Server, set the value of the DecodeQueryData parameter to yes.

Ignore Query Data in a URL

The IgnoreQueryData parameter affects the way Web Agents treat URLs. If you do not want the Web Agent cache the entire URL and send the URIs with their query strings to the Policy Server for rule processing, you improve performance with the following parameter:

IgnoreQueryData

Specifies whether the Web Agent will cache the entire URL (including the query strings) and send the entire URI to the Policy Server for rule processing. A full URL string contains a URI, a hook (?), and some query data, as shown in the following example:

URI?query_data

URLs that have been the subjects of requests are cached by default. Subsequent requests search the cache for a match. If requests for the same URI contain different query data, the match fails. Ignoring the query data improves performance.

When the IgnoreQueryData parameter is set to yes, the following occurs:

• The URL is truncated at the hook. Only the URI is cached and sent to the Policy Server. The query data is maintained elsewhere, for the purpose of maintaining the proper state for redirects.
• Only the part before the hook is sent to the Policy Server for rule processing.
• Both URIs in the following example are handled as the same resource:

  /myapp?data=1

  /myapp?data=2

When the IgnoreQueryData parameter is set to no, the following occurs:

• The entire URL is cached.
• The entire URI is sent to the Policy Server for rule processing.
• The URIs in the following example are handled as different resources:

  /myapp?data=1

  /myapp?data=2

Default: No

To have the Web Agent send only URIs to the Policy Server for processing, set the value of the IgnoreQueryData parameter to yes.

Important! Do not enable this setting if you have policies which depend on URL query data.