Blog

Final Update for FIM RC1 released

February 1, 2010

On Friday the product group released Update 3 for Forefront Identity Manager 2010 RC1 available through connect

https://connect.microsoft.com/site433/Downloads

Major changes as part of Update 3 (my regurgitation and comments from the release notes):

Fewer trips to the FIM Service event log – since the FIM MA export errors will now show up in the Synchronization Service Manager! Hallelujah!
Less need for custom old style code
- Now more than 1 MA can be authoritative for deleting an object (resource)
- New functions for Sync Rules (Declarative Provisioning) – I guess I will have to update my function cheatsheet
  - Null – not certain what they mean by this – null out the value or let another sync rule provide the value.
  - ReplaceString
New type of MPR – Set Transition MPRs vs. request based MPRs
- Run on Policy Update only applies to this type
- All other MPRs are – request based MPRs
- This should easy some of the difficulty in wrapping heads around MPRs.
DBA’s will love these:
- Backups without stopping the FIM Service and now supported!
- SQL Failover Clusters are now supported! (I don’t know if this means that clustering the Synchronization Service is supported)
Prereqs have changed
- Server Components
  - Windows Installer 4.5 is required,
- FIM Service requires SQL 2008 SP 1
- The addin for Outlook now needs Outlook 2007 SP 2

Even the certificate management side got some improvements: Windows Server 2008 R2

FIM Hand on Labs

February 1, 2010

More Hands on Labs for Forefront Identity Manager will be coming up (similar to the one I did in Irvine, CA) – Phoenix April 7th and 8th and then Dallas sometime in May.

http://feeds.feedburner.com/IdentityLifecycleManagerilmBestPractices

In this post I attempt to give you the reader a quick overview of how the FIM RCDC works conceptually. As for the mechanics of modifying the RCDC the nearly complete but growing collection of documents downloadable from MSFT will suffice.

As you will recall FIM is the new abbreviation for ILM, since it has been renamed Forefront Identity Manager, and RCDC is the Resource Control Display Configuration formerly known as the Object Visualization Configuration (OVC). RCDC is the way you custom how FIM displays objects (now called resources) in the portal. Now for English: If you need to change the options and information users see in the FIM portal when they create new users, groups (security or distribution), or edit or view these resources you do it by modifying the RCDC. The RCDC is an XML object, and each resource type (user, group, request, etc) has three: Create, Edit and View. To get a handle on the terms take a look at the figure below:

Answering my FIM RC 1 question

November 24, 2009

Thanks to Darryl Russi for answering my questions in my earlier post An Update to FIM RC1 where I was asked about something I had read in the release notes:

Some of those items raise a few questions, like how to setup a FIM service that only takes requests from the sync service? Do we setup multiple FIM Service instances and then configure the FIM MA to talk to one of them, and not make that one available to web clients?

Identity Synchronization FIM 2010 HOL Irvine California

November 23, 2009

I will be at the Microsoft Technical Center in Irvine on Dec 1 and 2 presenting this HOL with Marvin Tansley of Gemalto.

Identity Synchronization – Hands on Training

Date: December 1-2, 2009

Location: 3 Park Plaza, Suite 1800 Irvine, CA 92614 949-263-3000

Microsoft, Gemalto and Ensynch invite you to a free 2-day training seminar and hands-on-lab on Microsoft’s Forefront Lifecycle Manager (FIM 2010).

Come and learn how FIM 2010 can help you by delivering simplicity, agility and efficiency while increasing security and compliance within your enterprise identity infrastructure.

An Update to FIM RC1

November 8, 2009

Microsoft has posted an update to FIM RC 1, dated Nov 6.

It looks like this update covers pretty much everywhere except Certificate Services (sorry Brian and Paul).

The Release notes included in the download lists the follow improvements:

Query and Sets
Resolved a number of issues that resulted in incorrect dynamic set membership.
Removed support for the use of the != operator with multivalued attributes. Xpath equality expressions on multivalued attributes must use the not() function. For example, the following xpath is not supported: /Group[Owner != /Person]. Instead, use the following xpath: /Group[not(Owner = /Person)]

Continue reading

Identity Management Luncheon NYC

October 29, 2009

I will be speaking at an Identity Management Luncheon in New York City on Nov 12th. I will be speaking on FIM.

Come on down and join me if you can. (Please Register)

**When:Thursday, November 12, 200910:45 AM to 2:00 PM (EST)
Where:
**Del Frisco’s
Double Eagle Steak House
1221 Avenue of the Americas
New York, New York 10020

Come join us at this exclusive luncheon at one of the best steak houses in NYC!

Password Reset?

October 6, 2009

How would you feel if this was the only barrier between the hacker and your data – a single password reset question? Just one!

I won’t tell you who this is since then you’ll just want to go after my data on that site.

Oh well. The barn door won’t be shut until the wolf has gotten into the sheep

http://feeds.feedburner.com/IdentityLifecycleManagerilmBestPractices

Webinar: Accelerate Your Businesses for the Future with Microsoft Geneva (ADFS) and the Cloud

October 5, 2009

Get the rundown on Geneva from Frequent Industry Speaker and Nationally Recognized Microsoft ILM MVP,**
David Lundell**

When:**
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
10:30 to 11:30 (PST)
12:30 to 1:30 (CST)
1:30 to 2:30 (EST)**

Where:
Web/Online
Live Meeting Information
will be sent to attendees

Presenters:
David Lundell,
Identity Management
Practice Leader, Ensynch

Jonathan Sander
IAM and Security Analyst
Quest Software

Webinar: Accelerate Your Businesses for the Future with Microsoft Geneva (ADFS) and the Cloud
Has your organization been considering moving applications to the cloud or using Software as a Service (SaaS) providers? Have you already done it? Have you realized the cost savings?

FIM RC 1 is here – what’s new?

October 4, 2009

FIM RC 1 is here. Microsoft released it on Sept 30th which is the end of Q3 of 2009 which means the ILM/FIM team at Microsoft met their stated deadline announced back in March.

Here is the download:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/cc872861.aspx

What’s new:

Gil Kirkpatrick has a nice post about the differences in the data structure:

Auditing FIM 2010 RC1

Darryl Russi a Sr. Test Lead at Microsoft has started blogging about FIM RC 1 performance: