The reference configuration deployment architecture supports secure access to portal services, applications, and other content on an internal intranet to users on the public Internet. This feature is supported by the SRA Gateway module, as described in Secure Remote Access.
If your business solution does not require secure access to portal services, applications, and other content over the public Internet, then secure remote access is not a security requirement for your portal service deployment. For example, you might be using one of the following alternate scenarios to access the portal service:
An Internet-accessible portal service that communicates over SSL and is deployed in a DMZ
A portal service that is located behind an organization's firewalls and accessed only locally or through VPN connections
An internal portal service that is only accessed on a corporate network
In these scenarios, you can omit Chapter 7, Implementation Module 4: Secure Remote Access Gateway from the reference configuration architecture. However, depending on the scenario, you might need to modify the network topology of the reference configuration accordingly.