Can guest user access a public knowledge article without login into SSO authenticated instance?

[Nithin12]

Hi Team,

Can a guest user access a public knowledge article or a knowledge base   .?

If I try to access the for particular article directly trough URL, it is asking for SSO login?

Any Idea or suggestion will help me a lot.

We are on Helsinki.

Thanks.

Developer CommunityDiscussUser Groups

[Nithin12]

Hi Nia,

Thanks for your response.

I followed the steps mention in attached KB.

I am able to see only knowledge base, but not articles which are having public roles.

even i tried by removing all the roles and keeping roles empty in article, but no luck.

If i try to search with individual article with name I can able to see.

If I try to search trough KB I am not able see blank page.So what would be the reason?

Any suggestion..?

Thanks.

[ankit_sharma487]

i also followed the steps but it still ask me to login , will try some more and get back to you

[Dave Smith1]

I followed those steps and it worked for me - I made several knowledgebases public.   Take a look here: https://empdsmith2.service-now.com/

Direct link to one of my articles is here:

• https://empdsmith2.service-now.com/kb_view.do?sys_kb_id=040d9644db893e00685d717bbf961959
• Nicer URL here: https://empdsmith2.service-now.com/kb_view.do?sysparm_article=KB0010008

Note that when public access is granted:

1. User Criteria seems to be overlooked.   One of my restrictions is employees in a specific location, but without being logged in there's no way of determining their location... however, unable to validate this requirements still lets you through.   I've even tried adding a role but it still permits public access.   (I'm going to play more with this because I have actually hidden one from public view)
2. Links and buttons presented are not context-sensitive.   For example, you'll still get a "Create incident" button which takes the user down an inaccessible route, and the "Home" breadcrumb trail points back to /knowledge_home_launcher.do, rather than /kb_view.do or /kb_list.do - I've not found a way to make the nice /knowledge_home_launcher.do (actually $knowledge.do) a public page yet, but will play more.

[Nithin12]

Hi David,

Thanks for your reply, I have made Kb_home to active.

Now I am able to see the articles. I have one query, How to customize these categories i want to limit only for few.Please check the comparison screen shoot for your understanding.I want to see only General, applications and policies. How can i do that.

Thanks.

[Dave Smith1]

In Helsinki you can't apply User Criteria against a category, only against a KB.   Consequently, I've created a KB with public access and will create categories in there that are exposed.   As I understand it, if you think of a KB as a library, anyone with a library card permitted access to that library will be able to see all shelves (categories) unrestricted. If you wish to restrict specific shelves, move them into another library and only offer entry cards to specific individuals - i.e.: apply restrictions at KB level, rather than category or article level.

Most people aren't bothered about what KB they live in, more how to get to them - all KBs are trawled by the search tool and only accessible articles will display in the results - you can't use the search engine to circumvent security.

I heard that per-category restrictions are possible in Istanbul; I've not looked into it yet, but will investigate more.

For Helsinki, I understand per-article restrictions can be imposed: there's a field called "Roles" that can be added to the form and it's possible to hide specific articles that way.   For an example, I've made the article "Warranty coverage details for SCI..." in my "Policies" category visible to those with the asset role - so unauthenticated users can no longer see it in the list (revisit my instance and you'll see it's missing; search for "warranty" will reveal no results).

Hope that helps. Still experimenting, so I'll report back when I have more details.