providing a single sign-on to the end users so that they do not have to remember passwords for different backend applications; providing only the right information to the right user using authentication andauthorization methods. Using SAP's iView technology, you can literally extract data from any backend system.

Single Point of AccessToday’s world of e-business requires an increasing need to provide a single point of access tovarious business partners such as customers, suppliers, partners, and employees. It acts as an interface not only to your own company’s applications, but also to your business partners’ applications and third-party Internet services.The role of KM functionality in the portal is to manage the unstructured content that exists in various repositories such as file systems, websites, content management systems, e-mail systems, and so on. The portal can also be used to manage structured content such as data that are stored in transactional systems, data warehouse systems, and other legacy systems.The KM functionality is composed of two major components: Content Management and TREX. TREX is the search component of the KM functionality that enables searching documents and classifying documents using taxonomies. The Content Management portion of KM provides support for approval-based publishing, distributing and locating information based on indexing and classification of documents. It is possible to create subscriptions to documents so as to get notified of changes as well as to provide feedback on documents anddiscussions.

Identify the Portal TypesDepending on the type of users, the portal could be implemented either for internal users, externalbusiness partners such as customers and vendors, or even one time casual visitors. Examples ofportals are intranet portals that usually replace home-grown applications, supplier portals thatprovide vendor access to company information, customer portals such as the business-tobusiness(B2B) or business-to-consumer (B2C) scenarios, Business Intelligence (BI)–based portalsthat provide analytical information, and performance metrics dashboards.

Identify the Applications to Be Integrated• Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) applications such as SAP R/3, JD Edwards,Oracle, Peoplesoft, and so on.• Customer Relationship Management (CRM) applications such as mySAP CustomerRelationship, Siebel, and so on.• Supply Chain Management (SCM) applications such as mySAP Supply ChainManagement, mySAP APO, i2, and so on.• SAP applications based on Web Application Server, BSP (Business Server Pages), ITS(Internet Transaction Server), and IACs (Internet Application Components)• Data warehouse solutions such as SAP Business Information Warehouse (BW),Business Objects, and so on.• Legacy systems and other databases.• Collaborative groupware applications such as WebEx, Outlook, and Lotus Notes.• Web content management solutions such as Interwoven, EMC Documentum, andso on.