Tag: Identity Sync

Metacoda Plug-ins Tip: Replaceable Tokens

This is a tip for those who use the Metacoda Security Plug-ins Batch Interface for scheduled automation of SAS® metadata security reporting, testing and identity synchronization. You will find this tip useful if you are using the same configuration values in multiple batch configuration or Identity Sync Profile (IDSP) XML files and would like a way to specify these values in a single places rather than maintain them in multiple locations.

An enhancement that was added in Metacoda Plug-ins 6.1 R3 (Feb 2020) included Continue reading “Metacoda Plug-ins Tip: Replaceable Tokens”

Metacoda Identity Sync and Microsoft Security Advisory ADV190023

Those of you who use Metacoda Identity Sync may have already heard about Microsoft Security Advisory ADV190023. You may have heard about it from Stuart Rogers’ post on SAS Communities: SAS Viya The Importance of LDAP Encryption. Stuart’s article is about SAS Viya, but the Microsoft changes may have an impact on those sites that do LDAP-based identity synchronization with their SAS 9 platforms too. This includes Metacoda customers that use Metacoda Identity Sync. Naturally, this is something we have been getting some questions about recently – “How will it impact on the identity sync process?”

I think a good place to start would be to read the linked articles above, then discuss with your domain admins. They will be able to tell you if they plan on making the recommended changes and, if so, when they plan to make them. This might require you to change the way you configure your LDAP connection.

There has been some confusion about what changes Microsoft will make and when. It also looks like the extent and timing of those changes has evolved over time too. Quoting some of the sections of the advisory, as of today: Continue reading “Metacoda Identity Sync and Microsoft Security Advisory ADV190023”

Reviewing SSL/TLS Certificate Chain for Active Directory Server

Sometimes when I am setting up, or helping someone setup, identity synchronisation between the SAS® platform and Microsoft Active Directory (AD), I run into SSL/TLS certificate validation issues. I am usually using Metacoda Identity Sync, but it can also happen when doing a sync with custom Base SAS code. Often the underlying cause is that the AD server’s CA certificate is not in the SAS Private JRE Trusted CA Bundle (see Did I add that CA Certificate to the SAS Trusted CA Bundle?). When troubleshooting this, one of the first things I will do is look at the certificate that the AD server is providing, and I mostly use an OpenSSL s_client command for this. There are 4 command variations I use depending on whether I am trying to use the main directory or the global catalog, and with LDAP plus STARTTLS, or just LDAPS.

For connecting to the main directory on the unencrypted LDAP port 389 with an upgrade to encrypted using STARTTLS:

echo "Q" | openssl s_client -connect dc.example.com:389 -starttls ldap -showcerts

For connecting to the main directory on the encrypted LDAPS port 636:

echo "Q" | openssl s_client -connect dc.example.com:636 -showcerts

For connecting to the global catalog on the unencrypted port 3268 with an upgrade to encrypted using STARTTLS:

echo "Q" | openssl s_client -connect gc.example.com:3268 -starttls ldap -showcerts

For connecting to the global catalog on the encrypted port 3269:

echo "Q" | openssl s_client -connect gc.example.com:3269 -showcerts

If you want to examine the returned certificate in more detail then you can also pipe it to an OpenSSL x509 command e.g.

echo "Q" | openssl s_client -connect dc.example.com:389 -starttls ldap -showcerts | openssl x509 -noout -text

If you have questions, or any other tips for troubleshooting SSL/TLS certificates with AD, then please leave a comment below.

Configuring Metacoda Identity Sync Utils for AutoCall

I needed to extract some SAS identity related metadata today using the Metacoda Identity Sync Utils on GitHub. That repository contains some macros we publish to help our customers and partners when they need to get hold of some identity related metadata in SAS tables for custom Identity Sync processing or other reporting requirements (if the standard SAS %MDUEXTR macro doesn’t meet their needs).

Since I use these macros on a semi-regular basis, I decided to make them available to the SAS platform as autocall macros so I could just use them in my SAS code without having to remember where they were stored and %include them. I thought I’d post some brief notes on how to set it up in case you want to do the same (and for when I need it on another SAS platform installation). Continue reading “Configuring Metacoda Identity Sync Utils for AutoCall”

Metacoda Plug-ins Tip: Removing an Unwanted Auth Domain and Logins

This tip details how to go about removing an unwanted Authentication Domain and all associated Login objects from SAS metadata. A need for this can arise when you have been temporarily (or accidentally/unnecessarily) added a second set of inbound logins for all of your SAS users and you decide you no longer need those extra logins (perhaps you are migrating between authentication mechanisms).

If you are using the Metacoda Identity Sync Plug-in then the first step is to edit the Identity Sync Profile (IDSP file) using the Identity Sync Profile Wizard and untick the checkbox that configures the 2nd login. If you don’t do this, then the auth domain, and all the logins, will simply be re-added next time you run a sync! You can see a sample screenshot of the wizard page where you can unconfigure the 2nd login below:

Metacoda Identity Sync Plug-in Wizard with unchecked Second Login

After updating, and saving, the Identity Sync Profile you are almost ready to remove the unwanted auth domain and associated logins. Before removing the metadata it is a good idea to do the following: Continue reading “Metacoda Plug-ins Tip: Removing an Unwanted Auth Domain and Logins”