Identity Provider Configuration Examples

Provides examples of configuring the Service Provider account for SSO Circle and PingFederate.

Table of Contents

Identity Provider Configuration Example: SSO Circle

If you are using SSO Circle as your SAML Identity Provider, you can set up the domain in Policy Manager and then configure your Service Provider account in SSO Circle at www.ssocircle.com. Since SSO Circle's Identity Provider metadata file is publicly available, you can copy and paste the metadata when setting up the domain in Policy Manager.

To set up SSO Circle: high-level procedure

  1. In Policy Manager, set up SSO Circle as an Identity Provider. See To set up SSO Circle as an Identity Provider in Policy Manager below.
  2. In Community Manager, complete the setup by following the applicable procedure, depending on how you will be using the SAML domain:
  3. In your SSO Circle account, set up the platform as a Service Provider. See To set up the platform as a Service Provider using SSO Circle as the Identity Provider.
  4. In Community Manager, test to make sure your domain that uses the SAML Web Browser SSO feature works correctly:

Prerequisites:

To set up SSO Circle as an Identity Provider in Policy Manager

  1. Log in to the Policy Manager Console.
  2. Click the Configure tab, click Security, and then click Identity Systems.
  3. Click Add Identity System to access the Add Identity System wizard.
  4. In the first page of the wizard, for identity system type, choose SAML Web Browser SSO. Provide name and description, and then click Next.
  5. In the second page of the wizard, Select SAML Identity Provider Configuration Method, choose to configure using the metadata document, and enter the metadata URL for SSO Circle: http://idp.ssocircle.com.
  6. Click Next to access the SAML Identity Provider Configuration page, populated with the SSO Circle values as shown below.

    Policy Manager: SAML Identity Provider Configuration page for SSO Circle

    Note: If you chose to manually configure, you would need to enter the values on this page.

  7. Review the values, change the binding type if needed, and then click Next to access the Service Provider Configuration page, as shown below.

    Policy Manager: SAML Service Provider Configuration page for SSO Circle

  8. Enter the Service Provider configuration values, as needed:
    • Entity ID: A unique ID that you define yourself, to identify your Service Provider in the SAML authentication request messages. When setting up your account with the Identity Provider you must specify the Entity ID, which must be unique within the IdP so that the IdP can identify your Service Provider; then, you set up the same value in Policy Manager.
    • Base URL: used to construct the default Assertion Consumer Service (ACS) endpoint, the endpoint where the Service Provider will receive SAML assertions from the Identity Provider. Must be the container address of the container where the SAML Web SSO feature is initialized ({protocol_scheme}://{host}:{port}). For more information, see Base URL.
    • Authentication Request: Generally, you would choose to sign authentication requests.
    • Authentication Response: choose from the two supported bindings.
    • Sign Metadata: SSO Circle does not support signing of the metadata, so leave this box cleared.
    • Supported Name-ID formats: all are checked by default.
  9. Click Next to access the Manage PKI Keys page as shown below. Here you will set up the keys you will use to sign your SAML authentication request messages.

    Policy Manager: Manage PKI Keys page

  10. Choose to generate or import keys. If you choose Generate, provide values in the Certificate Details section. If you choose Import, you'll need to choose a key management option and provide keystore details as shown below.

    Policy Manager: Certificate Details, Key Management Options

  11. Specify additional key values if needed, and then click Next to access the Identity Mapping page as shown below.

    Policy Manager: Certificate Details, Identity Mapping

  12. Choose whether to send the NameID as the subject of the SAML assertion, or to use an attribute: if needed, define the subject attribute name.
  13. Set up the Attribute Mapping values to correspond with those set up in your SSO Circle account, as shown below.

    Policy Manager: Certificate Details, Attribute Mapping

    Note: SSO Circle supports only the above three attributes.

  14. Click Finish. The Service Provider metadata file is generated and is available at the following URL: {protocol_scheme}://{host}:{port}/saml/{sp_domain_name}/metadata. An example is shown below.

    SSOCircle metadata

    You will use this to set up your Service Provider account with SSO Circle, as shown in the next procedure.

    Note: Make sure you get the metadata.xml file for the container that has Community Manager installed (if the domain will be used for Community Manager login) and/or has the OAuth Provider feature installed (if the domain will be used for Community Manager OAuth domain, for resource owner authentication for at least one OAuth Provider).

To set up the platform as a Service Provider using SSO Circle as the Identity Provider

  1. Log in to your account at www.ssocircle.com.
  2. On the left, click Manage Metadata.
  3. Click Add New Service Provider. The page looks something like the below.

    SSO Circle: adding a new service provider

  4. Provide the following information:
    • FQDN of the Service Provider: This value must match the Entity ID in the Policy Manager domain setup, Service Provider Configuration tab.
    • Attributes: Choose one or more out of the supported attributes displayed. With SSO Circle, you cannot modify attributes.
    • Metadata information: Copy the content of the metadata.xml file generated as a result of your domain setup (see the previous procedure). Be sure to exclude the XML processing instruction at the beginning of the file. Paste it in the box.

      Note: Do not copy the XML from the browser window. Instead, click View Source and copy it from there, excluding the XML processing instruction at the top.

  5. Click Submit. The XML is processed and you should see a Success message when processing is complete. If there are any errors, review your information and make sure all the values were set up correctly in Policy Manager, then try again.

Note: If you make any changes, such as adding an OAuth Provider Domain in Community Manager, remember to update your SSO Circle account by pasting the revised metadata XML. If you are using the free SSO Circle account, you cannot edit your account; you'll need to delete the existing SP Metadata instance and then create a new one with the same name.

To configure and test in Community Manager

Once the setup in Policy Manager and the Identity Provider is complete, the steps to configure and test in Community Manager are the same for all Identity Providers. Follow the steps given earlier in this publication:

Identity Provider Configuration Example: PingFederate

This section provides additional information regarding setting up your Service Provider(SP) in PingFederate. In some cases, screen captures are provided; these are mainly taken from PingFederate version 8.3.1 and are offered only as examples.

When registering with PingFederate as the SAML Identity Provider (IdP), here is the recommended sequence of steps for setting up the domain in Policy Manager:

  1. Policy Manager Admin: Collects the following values and gives them to the PingFederate Administrator:
    • Policy Manager hostname
    • Entity ID that PingFederate should use for Policy Manager.
  2. PingFederate Admin: Uses these values to set up the Service Provider account in PingFederate.
  3. PingFederate Admin: Exports the custom PingFederate IdP metadata file and gives it to the Policy Manager Admin.
  4. Policy Manager Admin: Configures the PingFederate domain in Policy Manager, importing the PingFederate metadata file.

Note: If the security key you use for the account is issued by a third-party CA, you'll need to set up the CA as a trusted key issuer in Policy Manager. See Setting up credentials in PingFederate below.

The instructions below provide some of the steps.

PingFederate settings:

  • In PingFederate, choose Server Settings > Roles & Protocols. Click the checkboxes to enable Identity Provider role and support SAML 2.0, as shown below.

    PingFederate setup: enabling SAML

  • In PingFederate, choose Federation Settings > Protocol Endpoints. Set up the applicable endpoint for Single Login service, and copy the binding URL (either Redirect or POST). You will use this in your Policy Manager setup.
  • Conditional—if using HTTP Artifact for response binding: In PingFederate, when configuring security settings for the Artifact Resolution Service (Service Provider Credentials > Credentials > Configure, only available if HTTP Artifact is enabled), make sure you choose either HTTP Basic or Digital Signature for the authentication methods, and make sure that your choice matches your choice in Policy Manager setup, SAML Identity Provider Configuration page, as shown below.

    PingFederate setup: IdP config, authentication options

    The platform does not support the SSL Client Certificate option.

  • In PingFederate, if the Artifact Resolution Service is used, if you choose HTTP Basic authentication, you'll need to set up the username and password in the Basic Authentication (Inbound) tab that appears when you choose that option, as shown below

    PingFederate setup: IdP config, Basic Auth

Setting up credentials in PingFederate

In PingFederate, at the Credentials tab, shown below, there are three sets of credentials to configure:

  • Back-Channel Authentication: If applicable, configure the inbound authentication option for the Artifact Resolution Service at the IdP.
  • Digital Signature Settings: configure the signature certificate for the IdP, for the response (SAML assertion). Include PKI keys, not just the certificate.
  • Signature Verification Settings: configure the certificate for signature verification, for the IdP to verify the SP's signature on authentication request messages.

    PingFederate setup: credentials

To configure and test in Community Manager

Once the setup is complete in both the PingFederate Identity Provider and Policy Manager, the steps to configure and test in Community Manager are the same for all Identity Providers. Follow the steps given earlier: