I recently downloaded the ILM “2” beta 3. I’ve had a bit of a play with it, but this post is not going to be in-depth at all – just some random thoughts.
First a big thank you to the team at Microsoft for releasing a ready-made VM! After completely failing to get the beta 2 version working, with all its complicated software requirements, it was a joy to be able to get the beta 3 up and running so quickly.
The big change with “2” is the Sharepoint Portal. It has its own database (not sure if they’re still calling this the “Object Store”) which syncs to the familiar MIIS component using it’s own “ILM” MA. You do all your user/group creation and modification in this database, via the Sharepoint Portal. Because it’s built on Sharepoint you can add custom workflows – such as an approval process for group membership requests.
The VM also includes the promised end-user add ons – self-service Password Reset (from the logon splash screen) and self-service Distribution Lists (from an Outlook plugin). I can’t say what the impact will be of adding these in organisations with a lot of desktops, and different versions of Outlook, but they certainly would be useful to have.
The big change is definitely the Sharepoint Portal – it makes ILM look like a whole new product. It certainly makes my job easier when presenting ILM to potential customers – you can really do some nice demonstations: create a user in the portal, sync it through to AD, get the new user to request some mail lists, show the approval cycle… It sure makes a nicer looking demo than showing connector space objects in Identity Manager!
I still have more playing to do – I’m interested in how extensible the Object Store is, and whetherĂ‚Â I can modify the Sharepoint components. I alsoĂ‚Â want to have a look at the codeless provisioning … but just onĂ‚Â immediate impressionsĂ‚Â – I’mĂ‚Â feelingĂ‚Â very positive about the new developments.
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