News & comment
● SSO Plugin 3.1.1
posted by John B on 9th September 2010
A update release of SSO Plugin 3.1 has been released. The changes are largely focused on usability improvements and more informative logging to the SSO Administration Console.
A high level summary of the improvements in SSO Plugin 3.1 follows:
Support for Open ID, a commonly used web based SSO system used by Google, Yahoo, Flickr, Wordpress, Verisign, Facebook and other high profile organisations. You can now integrate the same technology into the BMC AR System Midtier. Please see our SSO Plugin and Open ID video walkthrough.
Full support for built-in Windows Authentication using the Kerberos and NTLMv2 protocols. This allows Windows 7, 2008, Vista, etc., clients to authenticate without an IIS front end.
Improvements to the SSO Administration Console including a range of Flashboards providing a graphical view of SSO activity. This can be seen at the end of the new installation video.
● XML Gateway licensing changes
posted by John B on 12th August 2010
The XML Gateway has been re-licensed. The Community Edition is free to use and only limited by 100 transactions per hour, and the unlimited Enterprise Edition can be purchased for high-volume implementations. Both packages are available with a support package, allowing you to enjoy JSS's excellent technical service for a reasonable price.
The latest release includes a number of new features and functions for integrating the BMC AR System with third party sources, and features a re-written installation and usage manual.
● JSS web site accounts
posted by andy on 10th May 2010
A new accounts system has been added to the JSS web site. Sign up with your e-mail address for access to the latest software updates, license generation, and further features in the future.
Customers previously using ad-hoc passwords please sign up using the new system to get control of your login details.
● SSO Plugin 3.0
posted by John B on 7th April 2010
The third major release of the SSO Plugin provides a range of improvements to both usability and the integration with third party systems. A high level summary of changes follows:
Full support for IIS as a front end to SSO Plugin. This includes the ability to delegate Windows Authentication to IIS.
Improvements to built-in authentication (formally known as internal Windows Authentication), which provides Kerberos and NTLMv1.
A new UI for the Midtier SSO Plugin component, fully integrated into the existing BMC Midtier configuration. Users can not access the SSO Plugin configuration without entering the Midtier configuration password.
Improvements to the Midtier 'test SSO' page in order to more accurately resolve SSO problems - most commonly, where users do not have a blank password or no entry in the User form.
Automated integration with BMC Remedy Knowledge Management, allowing users direct SSO access to RKM without first logging into ITSM.
Improvments to the Windows User Tool SSO module in order to work around a range of BMC issues that stopped some components functioning (such as Flashboards).
Improvements to the SSO Administrator Console, that sits neatly beside existing AR System Administration Consoles. The SSO AREA Plugin is fully configurable through this interface.
In version 2.4, the SSO AREA Plugin configuration was moved to the AR System, allowing a simplified deployment across multiple AR System servers. In version 3, the Midtier SSO Plugin configuration is stored in the AR System, so users need only configure the Midtier once, allowing other Midtiers to automatically pick up the configuration from the AR System.
Authentication logging within AR System allowing administrators to create user authentication management reports.
● SSO Plugin 2.4u4
posted by John B on 2nd April 2010
Support for IIS as a front end to the Midtier, fixes to AREA Plugin (with respect to server groups and timeouts reading configuration) and Siteminder integration fix.
● Materna Monitor
posted by Danny Kellett on 1st April 2010
Materna, a European reseller, produce an article on the SSO Plugin in their Materna Monitor magazine.
● XML Gateway 3.3
posted by John B on 17th February 2010
The XML Gateway has been updated with various bug fixes reported and new features, including:
Checksums: Updating thousands of records generates a huge load on your AR System. By defining a checksum, update operations will only occur when the input data has changed.
Throttling: Restrict the number of operations, such as ten per minute, one hundred per hour, etc.
● SSO Plugin version 2.4 beta
posted by John B on 18th January 2010
This major release of the SSO Plugin aims to further simplify the installation process and provide new functionality. Improvements include:
Removing the jss-sso.cfg configuration file from the JSS AREA Plugin: AREA Plugins have no ability to read data from an AR System form so the configuration had to be held in a file. In the 2.3 release, the product provided a form in which users could configure the jss-sso.cfg file, however this could lead to confusion with effectively two sources of data for the AREA Plugin configuration. The new release removes the configuration file after extensive re-coding of the AREA Plugin to allow it to read the configuration directly from the AR System form.
SSO Administration Console: The AREA Plugin is now configured through an SSO Administration Console, installed alongside the AR System administration consoles and linked from the Homepage.
Single Sign On for Remedy Knowledge Management: The BMC Remedy Knowledge Management product has a limited integration with BMC ITSM driven through workflow, which means users have to log in to ITSM in order to access RKM without logging in. While this may be suitable for service users, a larger group of end users may wish to search RKM without being required to login to RKM.
BMC provide no SSO interface to RKM, so we've examined the product and implemented our own interface. This version of the SSO Plugin solves the problem by providing a plugin to RKM that provides end users with SSO access without first logging in to ITSM.
This is the first release and is considered beta. It requires a few manual installation steps, and while trivial, a future version of the SSO Plugin will remove these steps.