The capabilities described on this page are included in Appian's standard capability tier. Usage limits may apply. |
Appian Portals allows you to reach any audience your organization works with, without requiring them to log in. You can use the low-code tools you already know to create web apps that connect portal users to the information and processes in Appian.
Creating a portal is a bit different from creating a site. Portals run in a service that is separate from your Appian environment, but can be connected to your Appian applications, data, and workflows. Because of this, there are some things you'll need to take into account when planning for and designing the functionality of a portal. This page provides these best practices.
Note: Appian Portals is currently only supported for Appian Cloud customers. Additionally, if your environment is behind a VPN, you cannot connect a portal to it to read or write data.
Functions, components, and objects can be either compatible, partially compatible, or incompatible with portals:
Review this section for how to determine compatibility, as well as how to use partially compatible functions and objects in a portal.
When you're designing an interface for a portal, you can use most of the components and functions that you know and love. However, there are some components and functions that are incompatible with portals.
There are two main ways to determine whether a function or component is compatible with portals: the Appian All Functions table in the docs and Appian design guidance in an interface or expression rule.
To find out if a function is compatible with portals using the filters on the Appian All Functions table:
If an interface or expression rule that is a precedent of a portal uses an incompatible or partially compatible function, a design guidance recommendation will display. If you see this design guidance:
Some functions and objects are partially compatible with portals. This means you can still use them in a portal, as long as you connect to them with a custom integration using integration and web API objects.
Some examples of partially compatible functions and objects:
a!urlForRecord()
.To use partially compatible functions and objects in a portal, call the function or object in a web API and use an integration object in the portal interface to call the web API.
The integration and web API form a bridge that connects your portal to Appian and allows data to pass through. The integration is on one side—in your portal—and the web API is on the other side—in Appian.
These are the high level steps to create a custom integration in a portal. For more detailed steps that outline a similar process, see working with data using CDTs.
To use a partially compatible function or object in a portal:
Appian-API-Key
.Note: If there are unexpected question marks (?) in the response body of the integration object, it may be because you need to modify the header parameter in the a!httpResponse() function of the web API expression to handle special characters. See this Knowledge Base article for more information.
rule!
domain prefix.You can use most component plug-ins in portals. This includes component plug-ins that you or your organization create. Additionally, some connected system plug-ins can be used with their associated component plug-in.
Because plug-ins can have a wide variety of capabilities, some of them may not be compatible with portals.
Before using a component plug-in, review the following to help determine if it will work in your portal.
Tip: If you are building a component plug-in, see Develop Component Plug-ins for Portals for guidelines on creating component plug-ins that will be compatible with portals.
If a component plug-in relies on a connected system plug-in, there is a chance that the connected system may not be compatible with portals.
For example:
If you are unsure if a connected system plug-in is compatible with portals, test it in a published portal or contact the plug-in developer. See Using connected system plug-ins in a portal for more information.
In order to publish successfully, portals must be under 25 MB. When you use a plug-in in a portal, the size of the plug-in file affects the size of the portal. Using a plug-in with a large file size may cause the portal to fail to publish.
You can check the size of a plug-in by downloading it from the Appian AppMarket or the Admin Console.
Some component plug-ins work with connected system plug-ins. See Check if the plug-in relies on a connected system plug-in for information on determining if the connected system plug-in will work in a portal.
When you use any connected system plug-in in a portal, be sure to add a service account to the portal that has Viewer permissions to the connected system.
While many component plug-ins will work in a portal, some are not compatible with portals for various reasons. For example, since you can't access group information in a portal, a plug-in that relies on groups won't work in a portal.
Be sure to fully test component plug-ins in a published portal to make sure they work correctly. If the plug-in does not work in the portal, contact the plug-in developer.
If you are using a connected system plug-in with a component plug-in in a portal:
The following is a list of some of the most popular component plug-ins that can be used in a portal, along with some information about how to use them in a portal.
Do not enable image uploads in the rich text editor. The Rich Text Editor connected system that is required for image uploads is not compatible with portals.
Tip: We recommend using the styled text editor component to allow users to input and format text.
Portals can use a!startProcess() in an interface to start a process. However, they cannot use any other method to start a process, such as through a start form or record action.
The portal service account must have at least Initiator permissions to the process model in order to start the process.
For more information, see Working with Data in Appian.
The developer and user experience for downloading files and viewing document images in a portal is the same as it is in the rest of Appian. Simply use the following components as you normally would.
There are a few things to keep in mind when uploading files in a portal, which are documented in the following sections.
Whether you are setting up your portal to view, download, or upload documents, make sure you set up the service account permissions correctly so that the portal has the required access.
When referencing documents in a portal, we recommend that you use a constant to serve the document directly from the portal. The constant must be of type Document. You can use the document ID instead, but that method is less performant than using a constant because the portal must query Appian for the document.
See the document download link, document image, and document viewer pages for specific examples of using a constant to download and view documents.
The following are some things to keep in mind when using file upload and signature components in a portal.
To write document IDs from uploaded files to a database through an integration, the integration input that you're writing must be of type Number(Integer), not Document. An incorrect type can cause the data and document IDs to not save properly.
Portal Best Practices