Grouper: A Toolkit for Managing Groups Tom Barton blair christensen University of Chicago

Outline The problem with groups Case study: U Chicago’s “USITE” computer labs Tour of Grouper USITE case study revisited Grouper project status Bonus round – personal groups Fall 2004 I2MM

Groups facilitate … Customization – application UI tailored to user’s affiliations with the organization Authorization “Lightweight” - relationship info feeding access decisions “Heavyweight” - assignment of structured privileges to groups Messaging, scheduling, & collaboration Departments, courses, programs, cmtes, teams, … Posix naming services Fall 2004 I2MM

Group management issues Coordinating many sources of information Provisioning groups in many locations Supporting several styles of access to group membership information Aging of groups and of memberships Use of subgroups vs. effective membership Referring to set theoretic combinations of groups (compound groups) Privacy & visibility requirements Fall 2004 I2MM

The USITE access problem Must control access to computers in labs independent of ability to authenticate U Chicago’s Networking Services & Information Technologies (NSIT) established the Identity Management Working Group to solve this type of problem You’ll see “nsit” and “usite” in names of things to follow Fall 2004 I2MM

USITE access policy Students Current faculty & staff are entitled 23 categories of current students Some entitle USITE access, some disenfranchise, others fail to entitle Time of year dependency for some categories Current faculty & staff are entitled Other more loosely affiliated people are not entitled Exceptional administrative admits and denies across all categories above Fall 2004 I2MM

Use of group management Various elemental USITE-related categories of people are modeled as groups Subgroups are used to roll-up effective admit or deny status Some groups are automatically managed, others manually Some roll-up groups are manually managed to deal with time dependency or change in access policy Fall 2004 I2MM

Groups model for USITE access (ACL is “shaded green but not red”) usite_eligible (manual) usite_barred (manual) admin_admit (manual) admin_deny (manual) uc:faculty (auto) uc:staff (auto) categories of barred students categories of entitled students time dependent student categories Fall 2004 I2MM

Management related groups Management privileges for manually managed groups also need to be managed! So, more groups list who has what authority in managing groups that mediate USITE access Director of Learning Environments Lab Managers Student staff Fall 2004 I2MM

Data flow & Grouper’s role in USITE access lab SIS Loaders Grouper API HR Person registry LDAP Grouper UI API Group registry Dir. Learning Environments uid: jdoe ucAffiliation: … isMemberOf: … Grouper API Lab Managers Student staff Fall 2004 I2MM

Grouper groups Stored in an RDBMS, the Group Registry Attributes of groups Name Description Members Possible to extend the set of attributes to support groups with more specific purposes Fall 2004 I2MM

Directory of groups Groups are created within a hierarchy of directories, like files within a computer’s directory system Directories are also named Sometimes need to use the full name of a group, like the full pathname of a file Example: /nsit/usite/admin_admit The directory delimiter can be configured for different effect Example: nsit:usite:admin_admit Fall 2004 I2MM

Grouper privileges Access privileges - who has what access (read, write) to a group’s attributes Naming privileges - who can create a group or subdirectory in what part of the directory of groups Fall 2004 I2MM

Access privileges VIEW group’s name in lists & can refer to it, e.g., make it a subgroup of another group READ basic information about a group UPDATE membership and administer VIEW, READ, & UPDATE privileges ADMIN can modify everything, including group name, description, & privileges, and can delete the group OPTIN can add self to the members list OPTOUT can remove self from the members list Fall 2004 I2MM

Naming privileges STEM privilege in a given directory enables creation of subdirectories and administration of CREATE and STEM privileges for the directory and its immediate subdirectories Motivating idea: a directory is a naming “stem” over which authority is exercised and delegated by those with stem privilege CREATE a group in a given directory Fall 2004 I2MM

Built-in privilege implementation All access & naming privileges can be assigned to individual members or to groups Subgroups, compound groups, and aging can be used to manage privileges Abstracted interfaces are presented for privilege management Sites can hook in their own privilege management and bypass Grouper’s built-in system Fall 2004 I2MM

USITE revisited – Grouper’s role Make an “nsit:usite” directory in the group registry Groups created within it dir_learning_env, lab_managers, student_staff usite_eligible, usite_barred admin_admit, admin_deny Give stem privilege for “nsit:usite” to the Director of Learning Environments She can run her groups empire within Fall 2004 I2MM

USITE group access privileges (unqualified names in nsit:usite namespace) usite_eligible A:dir_learning_env V,R:all usite_barred A:dir_learning_env V,R:all admin_admit U:usite_manage V,R:usite_view admin_deny U:usite_manage V,R:usite_view uc:faculty V,R:all uc:staff V,R:all categories of barred students V:all V:all V:all categories of entitled students V:all V:all time dependent student categories V:all V:all V:all V:all Fall 2004 I2MM

USITE group management privileges (unqualified names in nsit:usite namespace) Fall 2004 I2MM

Grouper v1 features API & UI for basic group management Create, read, update, delete, import, export Distributed management Subgroups & compound groups Aging of groups and memberships Abstracted interfaces for Group and directory privileges Subject lookup Last activity Fall 2004 I2MM

Phases of Grouper v1 development Phase 1: Basic management and export functions Phase 2: Compound groups & Signet integration Phase 3: Aging of groups and memberships Phase 1 API available before end of year (2004, that is!) Fall 2004 I2MM

Grouper deliverables U Chicago - Java API U Bristol - Java UI You – contributed loaders & connectors Subject Lookup implementation jointly with Signet project Group Registry creation scripts & sample batch import/export scripts Documentation Fall 2004 I2MM

Grouper UI status Conceptual mock-up completed Modular design for look and feel Grouper & Signet UIs will “leave the factory floor” bearing an I2 family resemblence Fall 2004 I2MM

Personal groups Any user can create groups named personal:username:groupname Good or evil? Yeah! Low overhead to let everyone do groups Booo! Valuable institutional data squirreled away in unknowable spaces that go away Configuration: on/off Root directory for personal namespace (“personal” above) Fall 2004 I2MM

Further info & participation MACE-Dir list MACE-Dir-groups conference calls http://middleware.internet2.edu/dir/groups Fall 2004 I2MM