April 23, 2009, 4:42 PM — Sun Wednesday tied its identity federation software to Google Apps and added its directory and Web application server to the cloud platform it is building for developers to build and test applications.
The company also expanded the integration between its Identity Management Suite and its open-source MySQL database.
The news comes just two days after Oracle said it would by Sun for $7.4 billion.
The acquisition of Sun brings a number of important technologies to Oracle, including the Java technology that forms the foundation of Oracle's middleware lineup. The deal also brings together a collection of identity software from both companies, which presents Oracle with a number of hard decisions for rationalizing the lineup.
Despite the acquisition, Sun made a number of announcements Wednesday around its open-source identity products.
Sun said it was adding support for Google App Premier Edition (GAPE) to its OpenSSO Express, http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/093008-sun-opensso.html an open source identity federation project that releases an update every three months.
GAPE, -- which includes Gmail with voice and video chat, Google Calendar, Google Docs, Google Sites, and Google Video for business -- is aimed at business users. OpenSSO Express will allow those users to sign onto GAPE using their corporate credentials.
OpenSSO is a set of Java-based technologies that include single sign-on, access management, federation and secure Web services. OpenSSO incorporates such standards as the Security Assertion Markup Language 2.0, Extensible Access Control Markup Language and WS-Federation; and such projects as OpenID and Information Cards
Sun also added to its cloud platform, making available via Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) platform its identity technology in the form of OpenSSO Enterprise and OpenDS Standard Edition, its open source directory. OpenSSO Enterprise is the commercial software developed from the OpenSSO project code base.
Sun also will make available via EC2 its GlassFish Portfolio, an open-source Web platform that includes the GlassFish application server. Sun is aiming the services at independent software vendors and system integrators in hopes they will use the services to test and pilot new applications.
Sun's OpenSolaris and MySQL are already available on EC2. Sun said it eventually will offer the services on its own Sun Compute Cloud and Storage Cloud platforms. Also Wednesday, Sun expanded the hooks between its Identity Management Suite and MySQL open-source database.
The integration gives users a backend that includes both the Sun OpenDS Standard Edition directory and the database for storing user information. The combination provides high-availability to information via the database stored in SQL as well as a standards-based directory built on the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol.
The mix also includes the Sun Virtual Directory, which can serve as an aggregator of data from both the database and the directory. The platform includes the Sun Identity Manager for provisioning users and Sun Role Manager, for compliance and governance.
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