Identity and access management (IAM)
Contents
Enonic XP ships with a clearly defined and pluggable concept for handling authentication and authorization
Introduction
Enonic XP ships with a standard concept handling users, authentication, groups and roles based authorization. Additionally, the NoSQL storage supports fine-grained access control mechanisms down to a single item.
IAM Concepts
XP IAM consists of three central concepts:
Principals
Principals are object that can be given permissions. There are three different types of principals:
- Users
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Principals that can be authenticated.
- Groups
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Used to group other principals to simplify management.
- Roles
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Provides access to application specific functionality.
Permissions
Principals may be given with fine grade access to items stored in the NoSQL storage. An example of this is the XP CMS, where users typically get access to create or publish content in specific areas of the solution.
Identity providers
ID providers offer pluggable abstraction layer for user authentication. As such, in order to authenticate or even create users in XP, you will need to define an ID provider.
IDproviders are linked to your webapp or site through virtual hosts.
Creating an ID provider
IDproviders can be created and managed through the API, or through the Users app in the XP admin console.
An idprovider essentially consist of the following:
-
A unique name (cannot be changed later)
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ID provider application, with optional configuration settings.
-
Permissions - specifies who can manage and access the ID provider
| ID provider applications must be installed before you can select them. |
System ID provider
XP ships with a special ID provider that cannot be removed or renamed. It is called the system ID provider.
The purpose of the system ID provider is to hold system users such as su - the Super User, and anonymous - the user that is defacto if no other user is specified.
When accessing the XP admin console for the first time in a fresh installation, you will see the system IDprovider.
| Avoid placing your regular users in the system ID provider, rather create a new ID provider instead. |
IDprovider apps
In order for an ID provider to work, it must be associated with an ID provider application that handles the authentication process.
You may install ID providers from Enonic Market, or build your own for a fully customized experience.
Standard ID provider app
By default, XP ships with an app app called the "Standard ID provider". This is also the app that is being used by the System ID provider
Built-in roles
Enonic XP is shipped with several built-in roles (described below) which grant certain permissions when applied to users. New roles can be created by users with Administrators and Users Administrator roles.
| Permissions for every role can be overridden by Administrator or Content Manager Administrator on the content level. |
Administrator Users with the Administrator role have full access to all content and admin tools through the user interface.
Administration Console Login Users with this role can log in to the administration console. These users will also require a role for each of the admin tools that the users need access to.
Content Manager Administrator
This role allows full access to Content Studio, including ability to create and delete content projects.
Content Manager Expert
This role gives members ability to view and modify source code in the rich text editor.
Content Manager App
Give users to access to the legacy default project in Content Studio. Users with this role can see content and sites, but cannot create new sites or any new content in the project.
| As of v7.3, XP supports creation of custom content projects. These offer project-specific roles that automatically provide access to both Content Studio and the project itself. |
Users App
Provides view-only access to the Users admin tool.
Users Administrator
Grants full access to the Users admin tool, including create/edit/delete for Id providers, users, roles, and groups.
Authenticated
Users automatically get this role when they are logged into the platform, regardless of IDprovider.
Everyone
A special role that both authenticated users, and visitors (Anonymous user) all have in common. The role is for instance used to grant read permissions to publicly available content projects.
Schemas Administrator
Grants permissions to manipulate virtual applications and schemas.
NOTE: If you are using Content Projects, your project will have a set of project-specific roles in addition to the built-in ones.
