Re: Web single sign-on

From: Eric Rostetter (eric.rostetterat_private)
Date: Mon Dec 09 2002 - 11:24:07 PST

  • Next message: Dan Kaminsky: "Re: Web single sign-on"

    Quoting Marty <martiat_private>:
    
    > We have a big discussion going on at one of my clients as we are about
    > to add an Internet portal to several applications. We are looking at
    > implementing a single sign-on (SSO) solution for our web applications.
    
    Good idea.
    
    > 1- Should we buy an already made up single sign-on solution or build one
    > in house?
    
    Or use an existing opensource solution.
     
    > We've met with the people from Tivoli and Computers associates already.
    > Other suggestions?
    
    Nope.  Lots out there.
    
    > 2- What if we go for a temporary in-house solution for next year and get
    > stuck with it as the portal and the number of applications starts
    > growing?
    
    Then you need to make sure the in-house solution you pick, even if only
    meant to be temporary, is flexible and extensible.
    
    > My concern here is the potential of risk being blamed by the auditors
    > about an in-house development vs a well known product.
    
    I wouldn't worry about that.  Either cen be secure/insecure, cheap/expensive,
    easy/hard to maintain, etc.  No clear advantage either way without knowing
    your extact setup (manpower available, skill level, etc).
    
    > The number of users of the portal will grow in the ten of thousands by
    > the end of next year. Robustness of the solution should also be a main
    > factor.
    
    Yes, but that doesn't affect the choice of in-house/opensource/commercial.
    
    > The security of the project is taken care of by firewall, access list,
    > DMZ etc.
    
    Well, I'd sure not depend on only that.  Build security into everything,
    including the single-signon.  Security through depth.
    
    > The number of different application is already up to ten and the portal
    > is not even built yet. The deployment of the appliactions (all web
    > based) should start as early as march 2003.
    
    Normal.
    
    > Pre-requisites : We have to work with the fact that the environment is
    > IBM Websphere servers and the fact that we are already using LDAP for
    > authentication on some applications. No comments on that part please, we
    > have to live with it...
    
    Look at commerical apps and opensource apps (like Horde at www.horde.org)
    and see if anything meets your needs.  If not, then go in-house.
    
    > Thanks!
    > 
    > Marty
    
    -- 
    Eric Rostetter
    The Department of Physics
    The University of Texas at Austin
    
    Why get even? Get odd!
    



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