ForgeRock Tutorial

Introduction to ForgeRock

ForgeRock is a digital identity and access management (IAM) software system founded in the year 2010. ForgeRock is a multinational company located in the United States of America. This ForgeRock tool offers digital identity and accessibility for consumers and also empowers the workforce. The main purpose of using the ForgeRock software tool is to provide delightful and secure consumer experiences. And also empower an efficient and secure workforce. One of the important functionality of the ForgeRock tool is that it protects your connected devices and data streams. Many applications have been using this tool such as government, healthcare, retail, finance, social media, and communications. ForgeRock tools help everyone to interact with modern internet technologies.

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Why ForgeRock?

As I said earlier, the ForgeRock software tool provides the digital identity and accessibility with the devices and also secure the things. This also improves workforce empowerment and offers delightful consumer services. The following are the important key features of ForgeRock those explain why we need ForgeRock:

• This tool manages active directory objects and properties.
• Also manages the active directory permissions.
• Manages the active directory access.
• Connects each type of connectible application.
• Massive configuration and customization capabilities.
• Offers extensive workflow engines.
• Manage target system permissions.
• Compliance and access system configuration.
• Secured connectivity with people, things and devices
• Manages target system objects and properties.

These are all the important functionalities of the ForgeRock tool

ForgeRock Architecture in Detail:

ForgeRock Architecture explains the functionalities, components and how does it operates with the devices, Let me explain the architecture in detail;

ForgeRock solutions are based on identity and access management solutions, which are used for securing your devices or things. The identity and access management solutions were not designed by easily integrated application ( on-premises or off), which offers the following mechanisms such as; 

• to provide secure device-agnostic access at all times 
• to handle large-scale populations such as what is needed for customer-oriented deployments.
• to make decisions based on consumer context.

 They require platforms that can securely identity-enables new services in months not years, manage the identities of user's devices, and the internet of things (IoT). Supports the massive scale required for consumer identities and machine-to-machine microservices, and maintain a persistent identity across a multiple of devices and services. ForgeRock is nothing but a modern version of Identity and access management platform. At a fundamental level, the ForgeRock contains the following components such as;

• How the person will be identified in a system.
• How the roles will be identified and how they will be assigned to that person.
• Adding, deleting, and updating that personal details and his roles.
• Secure the sensitive data in the system and also secure that system itself.
• Assigning the level of access management to that person or group of people.

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Overview of ForgeRock

ForgeRock is nothing but part of the Identity and access management platform. The purpose of using ForgeRock is to deliver a flexible and compliance set of services at the time when the consumer faces the issue with traditional access management features. This ForgeRock offers different kinds of legacy services such as Single-sign-on service, Social sign-on, secured authentication, mobile authentications, self-service benefits, web devices security, and federations. ForgeRock has a unique set of architecture component that supports the use case scenarios form complex consumer requirements and connected devices, to multiple protocol federations. This system tool also offers secured machine-to-machine solutions and also enables single-sign-on for cloud systems. At the highest level of ForgeRock application, developments consist of java applications, stateful session management, and client-side application programming interfaces (APIs). These interfaces enable the custom plugins, policy governance for web and web site applications.

If you have any doubts on ForgeRock, then get them clarified from ForgeRock Industry experts on our ForgeRock Community!

ForgeRock – An Identity and Access management tool (IAM).

ForgeRock is a modern version of identity and access management (IAM) tool developed to overcome the hurdles faced with traditional access management features.

• The features and capabilities of the ForgeRock identity and access management platform:
• Users can access more than 100+ inputs for identity, orchestration, and dynamic access decisions.
• Business context -> includes transactions, resources, and scope.
• Security context -> frauds and security behavior with artificial intelligence and machine learning.
• Relationship context -> User-user and user-device relationships.
• This sends signals and outputs to the fabric of the digital enterprises for security and agility.

ForgeRock Backstage Knowledgebase

The ForgeRock Backstage knowledge base contains information like how to diagnose any kind of issue within your organizations or applications.

There are mainly 3 types of backstage knowledge base available:

• Android  SDK Troubleshooting
• IOS SDK troubleshooting
• JavaScript SDK troubleshooting

The ForgeRock SDKs help you to integrate the ForgeRock identity platform authentication services into any web or mobile services.

Steps:

1. Registration and authentication tree:

This ForgeRock SDKs registration and authentication tree support the developer to create and configure the end-user profiles. Users can easily plug into external devices using jailbreak detectors and anomaly analyzers.

2. Access Token Acquisition:

The ForgeRock SDK architecture offers multi-step OAuth 2.0 acquisition and token management.

v Acquire a session token using the authentication tree:

v Acquire OAuth tokens using session token:

3. Architecture:

Tiered SDK component design allows integration at any level. The SDK integration contains User interface (UI) rendering modules, intermediate API wrappers, and lower-level application programming interfaces (API).

4. Abstraction layer:

The ForgeRock SDK architecture comprised of frameworks. This SDK framework incorporates an abstraction layer to consume integrations and make them uniform.

Directory services in ForgeRock:

Directory services in ForgeRock define how to store the individual data and where you will be stored. Using Directory services you will get these three services such as,

• Administration Guide
• Security guide
• Developer’s Guide

A directory resembles a dictionary or a phone book. Users can look up to their entry in the dictionary to learn its definition or its pronunciation. Where a ForgeRock directory differs from a paper dictionary or phone book is in how entries are added. Dictionaries of ForgeRock typically contain one index-word defined those dictionary indexes in alphabetical order. Phone book names in alphabetical order and directories entries on the other hand are often indexed for multiple attributes, names, the user identifies, email addresses, and telephone numbers.

ForgeRock Directory services are based on the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP). ForgeRock directory services also provide Restful access to directory data, yet as directory administrators. Users will find it useful to understand the underlying model even if most users are accessing the directory over HTTP rather than LDAP.

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ForgeRock installation guide

Here is the guide to install ForgeRock installation on a single java server or multiple java servers. I would like to explain in a pointwise.

Steps involved in ForgeRock Installation:

1. Preparing for Installation.

• Installation actions:
• Install quickly for evaluation using default settings
• Install Open AM server, choosing the setting
• Erase the configuration and start over
• Add an open Am server to a site
• Install ssroadmin for CLI configuration
• Perform a Command-line install
• Skin Open AM  for your organization
• Uninstall Open AM.

2. Deployment of open AM.

The openAM-13.0.0.war file contains the OpenAM server with Console. You can deploy .war file depends on your web service container.

3. Browse to the initial configuration screen, for example, http://openam.example.com:8080/openam.

4. Configure OpenAm with defaults:

This default OpenAm configuration configures the embedded OpenDJ servers using default configuration ports. If the end-user uses the already existing ports, then OpenAm uses the free ports to store and configuration purposes.

The default configuration forms the cookie based on the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) of the system.

Openam.example.com and the cookie domain will be set to .example.com

Navigations are as follows

1. In the initial configuration scree -> click create default configuration -> under default configuration toolbar.

2. Review the software license and privacy agreement. -> Click the button "I accept the license agreement", -> then click the continue button.

3. Now you need to provide a different password and username for the default OpenAm administrator -> amadmin -> default the policy agent users.

4. Once the configuration completes -> click the proceed to log in -> then login as the openAM administrator -> using the first two passwords you provided.

After successful login to the OpenAM software, OpenAm redirects you to top-level OpenAM realms.

[Related Article: ForgeRock Tutotial]

Deploying the ForgeRock identity platform:

Users can perform deploying the ForgeRock identity platform based on Cloud deployment and make them run smoothly on Java Environment.

ForgeRock Identity platform experts and cloud technology experts define the following basic requirements for your product deployment. Requirements might be included are, integrating system, identity database and applications, platform and deploying infrastructure requirements like back up, system monitoring tools, Git repository management, quality assurance, security, and load testing assurance.

In this platform configuration section, ForgeRock identity platform experts perform configuration of Identity or Access Management and IDM systems using the CDK tools and help them to build the identity images for the Identity platform. The following diagram explains the platform configuration tasks.

Next in the cluster configuration activity, cloud technology experts configure the Kubernetes cluster that will host the ForgeRock identity platform for optimal performance and reliability. The other tasks  included are;

• Modifying the cluster configuration to suit your business needs.
• Setting up the monitoring, alert to track the health sites and performance.
• Backing up the configuration and user data for disaster preparedness.
• Securing your deployment and provide information about the cluster configuration.

In the site reliability engineering activity, the developer monitors the ForgeRock identity platform deployments and makes them running on your business requirements. This may include activities such as;

• Use cases
• Server-level agreement
• Thresholding
• Loading test profiles.

ForgeRock identity platform deployment work is not yet finished; you need to customize the configurations for your cluster to meet all the service level requirements. You can also alter the ForgeRock Identity platform’s configuration features to helps users with advanced capabilities.

Once done with the Identity platform configurations, the user needs to monitor the system, availability, and review changes to identity and access management needs.

ForgeRock Automation tools

The following are important tools that are used to automate your access management or OpenAM deployments.

Amster – Amster is a lightweight command-line interface. This tool is ideal for DevOps processes such as continuous integration and Identity platform deployment. Amster tool is available in Access management version 5.0 and mainly integrated to replace the following tools namely;

• SSOADM
• AMpassword
• Configurator.jar
• Upgrade.jar

Configurator.jar – this is one of the java tools used for creating instances for access management and Identity platform deployment. This tool helps to find the configuration file and setup Access management or open access management according to that configuration file. When you install AM/Open AM from the consoles, the parameters of the configurator. The jar file will be written to the installation log. This tool can also be used to generate parameters for such a configuration file.

Check out here for frequently asked ForgeRock interview questions & answers for freshers & experienced professionals

Upgrade.jar – this tool is almost similar to the Configurator.jar tool and used for performing configuration file upgrades.

Ssoadm – this is one of the main command-line configuration tools used in OpenAM platforms. Once the user deploys the OpenAM identity platform, this tool helps them to configure all the aspects of OpenAM configuration processes. This tool can be run on batch mode and processes the command line batches in a configuration file.

REST interface- Almost all the OpenAM configuration process can be done by using the REST interface tool. The REST interface tool performs the following activities such as,

• quickly logging on as amadmin
• Performing any configuration changes the system needs.
• Creates the interactions with script file such as JSON, JSP, etc. in any browser's development explorer. Users can also use the API explorer to locate REST API endpoints.

ForgeRock Modular framework

ForgeRock is integrated with an identity management software tool to build product functionality and solutions. When it comes to the ForgeRock framework, this modular 

1. Infrastructure Modules components:

• This Infrastructure module provides the unique features needed for the services.
• BPMN 2.0Workflow engine – This embedded workflow or business process engine is based on the models like Activiti and business process model/notations.
• Task scanner – the task scanner component scans the specified properties, on scheduled time intervals. This scanning mechanism executes the tasks when the property value matches a specified value.
• Scheduler – this scheduler features the quartz triggers and simple basic triggers. It performs activities like,
• Regular trigger reconciliations
• Live Sync
• Scripts to store and run the reports
• Workflow trigger
• Custom logging.
• Script Engine- this scripting engine is a pluggable component module which provides the triggering and plugin points for the Identity management system. It can be performed using JavaScript and Groovy programming language.
• Policy Service – This component used to apply the validation procedures to objects or properties, when they are updated or created.
• Audit Logging – Audit logging performs the logging activities of all the relevant system users and also configures the log stores. This uses the reconciliation data as a base for reporting and activity logs to capture the internal and external objects' operations.
• Repository – This component abstracts the pluggable persistence layer. IDM framework modular provides Reconciliation of data and synchronization with several external data stores like relational databases (RDBMS), LDAP data servers, CSV, and XML files.

The Repository API component uses the JSON-based object model with RESTful automation tool principles. The main purpose of using this component is for testing and embedded instances for ForgeRock services.

2. Core Services -> Core service is the heart of the resource-oriented object model and infrastructure.

• Object model
• Managed objects
• System object
• Mapping
• Synchronization and Reconciliations.

3. Securing Common REST commands.

4. Access Layer

• Restful interfaces
• User interfaces. 

Advantages of ForgeRock

The following are the important key befits of using ForgeRock. Let me explain in detail;

Improve customer experiences:

Customer expectation changes with every innovative product and new services. They demand that your organization provide them with the same digital experience they have at other companies.

Digital transformation services:

Digital technology changing organizations, products, and services, it is a source of innovations. Enterprises are facing the challenge of undergoing a digital transformation that will bring about mainly internal changes. While external partners are looking for ways to offer the end-users the optimal customer experience.

• ForgeRock offers flexible deployment
• Fully transparent
• Rapid deployments.
• High availability.
• Clustering and appliance or virtual.
• Multiple modes: agents, spanning, and bridge.
• Broad coverage
• Security and governance.

Conclusion:

This article may help a few of you to learn the ForgeRock identity and access management features, capabilities, and framework modules. The main purpose of using ForgeRock is to provide security for your connections, devices, or systems. ForgeRock's advanced automation tools help to integrate your end-user business applications and also offers digital transparency for customers. I hope the ForgeRock tutorial may be beneficial for those who want to upgrade their identity management skill sets and also for ForgeRock community forums.