Reducing number of logins ids to access application

[Joanne Keegan]

Some of our users are required to enter their login id and passwords up to three times to access one of our applications. The question has been asked if this can be reduced.

The first login gets the user into our intranet, the second to the unix host, and the third into the application.

The first login to the intranet is critical, so this cannot be changed.

We do not want to go a trusted system (as at this stage it is not the site standard). We are running HP/UX 11.0 (users access this via Qvterm). The application is within UniVerse. A user's login id to the unix/application level may be different than that at the intranet level.

Does anyone have any ideas on how we may be able to reduce the number of logins. I know we could remove the requirement for a password at the unix level (which makes me feel very uncomfortable - and I doubt this would ever be approved anyway), but the user would still need to enter their login id.

Any ideas?

Thanks,

Jo

[David Lieberman_1 · Accepted solution]

Hi Joanne,

LDAP comes to mind - to synchronize the intranet, and application ID and passwords. I'm not a fan of using LDAP for UNIX IDs, but I heard that it may be available in 11i. I haven't taken the time to verify that yet.

You might want to look at accessing the application without having the user start a shell session. If the application allows a client (desktop)-server connection (similar to odbc or jdbc), you may be able to connect directly from an intranet web page or their PC desktop (client component) without logging in to the unix host.

Please let me know if any of this sounds applicable.

David Lieberman

[Joanne Keegan]

Hi David,

Your suggestions do sound applicable. I will investigate what you have said.

Thanks for your reply.

I will award points in the very near future.

Regards,

Jo

[Shannon Petry]

There are a few other things to look at.

1. Can your app use ident to get usernames for auth?
2. Can any of these be kerborized?
3. Can any of these use auth on the HP?
4. LDAP

ident of course would be the easiest, but least secure method. Just look up the username against a list for access.
kerberos is themost secure answer. Since tokens are cached on the client and server, diffreent methods of checking could be used. Also, all handshaking and calls are made encrypted.
using auth on the hp would mean the user still has to use a name/password, but it would be the same as the unix login.

LDAP may not be supported by all of your applications. While the uni-login is a great idea and support for LDAP is growing it is mostly in the OS area, and not the application level.

Regards,
Shannon