Skip to content

Configuring a Read-write LDAP User Store

WSO2 identity server uses an embedded Read/Write LDAP as the primary user store. This document will guide you to change that to a Read-Only LDAP user store.

Tip

Please read the topic Configuring User Stores to get a high-level understanding of the user stores available in WSO2 Identity Server (WSO2 IS).

Configuring Read-write LDAP user store manager

The following are the minimum configurations that are needed to be provided to configure the Read-only LDAP user store manager.

Configuration Name Display Name Description
type User Store Type Type of the user store manager that we are using.For Read-only LDAP user store manager this value should be read_only_ldap_unique_id.
base_dn User Search Base DN of the context or object under which the user entries are stored in the user store. When the user store searches for users, it will start from this location of the directory
Sample values: ou=Users,dc=wso2,dc=org

Following are the minimum user store properties that are needed to be provided to configure Read-only LDAP user store manager.

Property Id Primary User Store Property Secondary User Store Property Description
ConnectionURL connection_url Connection URL

Connection URL to the user store server. In the case of default LDAP in Carbon, the port is specified in the carbon.xml file, and a reference to that port is included in this configuration.

Sample values:
ldap://10.100.1.100:389
ldaps://10.100.1.102:639

If you are connecting over ldaps (secured LDAP)
Need to import the certificate of user store to the client-truststore.jks of the WSO2 product. For information on how to add certificates to the truststore and how keystores are configured and used in a system, see Using Asymmetric Encryption.
Using asymmetric encryption

If LDAP connection pooling is used, see enable connection pooling for LDAPS connections.
performance tuning ldaps pooling)

ConnectionName connection_name Connection Name

The username used to connect to the user store and perform various operations. This user does not need to be an administrator in the user store or have an administrator role in the WSO2 product that you are using, but this user MUST have permissions to read the user list and users' attributes and to perform search operations on the user store. The value you specify is used as the DN (Distinguish Name) attribute of the user who has sufficient permissions to perform operations on users and roles in LDAP

This property is mandatory.
Sample values: uid=admin,ou=system

ConnectionPassword connection_password Connection Password Password for the ConnectionName user.

Replace the default user_store configuration in the <IS_HOME>/repository/conf/deployment.toml file, as per your ldap server configuration. A sample configuration is given below.

[user_store]
type = "read_write_ldap_unique_id"
base_dn = "ou=system"
connection_url = "ldap://localhost:10389"
connection_name = "uid=admin,ou=system"
connection_password = "admin"
Apart from above properties WSO2 Identity Server also supports advanced LDAP configurations. Please refer to the following topic.

Properties used in Read-write LDAP user store manager

Any of the following properties can be configured for the PRIMARY user store by adding them as follows to <IS-HOME>/repository/conf/deployment.toml.

[user_store]
<Property-Name> = <Property-Value>
For example :

[user_store]
read_groups = true

Note

In the table given below, the Primary User Store Property column has the PRIMARY userstore properties that can be configured in the deployment.toml file. The Secondary User Store Property column has the properties that can be configured for a secondary user store through the Management Console.

Property Id Primary User Store Property Secondary User Store Property Description
UserEntryObjectClass user_entry_object_class User Entry Object Class Object class used to construct user entries.
Default: identityPerson( Is a custom object class defined in WSO2 Identity Server)
UserNameAttribute user_name_attribute Username Attribute

A uniquely identifying attribute that represents the username of the user. Users can be authenticated using their email address, UID, etc. The value of the attribute is considered as the username.

Default: uid

Note: email address is considered as a special case in WSO2 products, if you want to set the email address as username, see Using email address as the username

UserIDAttribute user_id_attribute User ID Attribute

The attribute used for uniquely identifying a user entry. The value of the attribute is considered as the unique user ID.

Default: scimId

UserNameSearchFilter user_name_search_filter User Search Filter Filtering criteria used to search for a particular user entry.
Default : (&amp;(objectClass=person)(uid=?))
UserNameListFilter user_name_list_filter User List Filter Filtering criteria for searching user entries in the user store. This query or filter is used when doing search operations on users with different search attributes.

Default: (objectClass=person)
In this case, the search operation only provides the objects created from the person object class.
UserDNPattern user_dn_pattern User DN Pattern

The pattern for the user's DN, which can be defined to improve the search. When there are many user entries in the LDAP user store, defining a UserDNPattern provides more impact on performances as the LDAP does not have to travel through the entire tree to find users.

Sample values: uid={0},ou=Users,dc=wso2,dc=org

DisplayNameAttribute display_name_attribute Display name attribute This is an optional property. The Display Name Attribute is the name by which users will be listed when you list users in the management console.

Default: blank

ReadGroups read_groups Read Groups When WriteGroups is set to falses, this Indicates whether groups should be read from the user store. If this is disabled by setting it to false, none of the groups in the user store can be read, and the following group configurations are NOT mandatory: GroupSearchBase, GroupNameListFilter, or GroupNameAttribute.

Default: true
Possible values:
true: Read groups from user store
false: Don’t read groups from user store

WriteGroups write_groups Write Groups Indicates whether groups should be write to the user store.

Default: true
Possible values:
true: Write groups to user store
false: Do not write groups to user store, so only internal roles can be created. Depend on the value of ReadGroups property, it will read existing groups from user store or not

GroupSearchBase group_search_base Group Search Base

DN of the context or object under which the group entries are stored in the user store. When the user store searches for groups, it will start from this location of the directory

Default: ou=Groups,dc=wso2,dc=org

GroupEntryObjectClass group_entry_object_class Group Entry Object Class Object class used to construct group entries.
Default: groupOfNames
GroupNameAttribute group_name_attribute Group Name Attribute Attribute used for uniquely identifying a group entry. This attribute is to be treated as the group name.
Default: cn
GroupNameSearchFilter group_name_search_filter Group Search Filter

Filtering criteria used to search for a particular group entry.

Default: (&amp;(objectClass=groupOfNames)(cn=?))

GroupNameListFilter group_name_list_filter Group List Filter

Filtering criteria for searching group entries in the user store. This query or filter is used when doing search operations on groups with different search attributes.

Default: ((objectClass=groupOfNames)) In this case, the search operation only provides the objects created from the groupOfName object class.

RoleDNPattern role_dn_pattern Role DN Pattern

The pattern for the group's DN, which can be defined to improve the search. When there are many group entries in the LDAP user store, defining a RoleDNPattern provides more impact on performances as the LDAP does not have to traverse through the entire tree to findgroup.

Sample values: cn={0},ou=Groups,dc=wso2,dc=org

MembershipAttribute membership_attribute Membership Attribute

Defines the attribute that contains the distinguished names (DN) of user objects that are in a group.

Default: member

MemberOfAttribute member_of_attribute Member Of Attribute Define the attribute that contains the distinguished names (DN ) of group objects that user is assigned to.
Possible values: memberOf
BackLinksEnabled back_links_enabled Enable Back Links Defines whether the backlink support is enabled. If you are using MemberOfAttribute attributes this should be set to 'true'.
Default : false
UsernameJavaRegEx username_java_regex Username RegEx (Java) The regular expression used by the back-end components for username validation. By default, strings with non-empty characters have a length of 3 to 30 allowed. You can provide ranges of alphabets, numbers and also ranges of ASCII values in the RegEx properties.
Default: [a-zA-Z0-9._\-|//]{3,30}$
UsernameJava
ScriptRegEx
username_java_
script_regex
Username RegEx (Javascript) The regular expression used by the front-end components for username validation.
Default: ^[\S]{3,30}$
UsernameJavaReg
ExViolationErrorMsg
username_java_reg_
ex_violation_error_msg
Username RegEx Violation Error Message Error message when the Username is not matched with UsernameJavaRegEx
Default: Username pattern policy violated
PasswordJavaRegEx password_java_regex Password RegEx (Java) The regular expression used by the back-end components for password validation. By default, strings with non-empty characters have a length of 5 to 30 allowed. You can provide ranges of alphabets, numbers and also ranges of ASCII values in the RegEx properties.
Default: ^[\S]{5,30}$
PasswordJava
ScriptRegEx
password_java_
script_regex
Password RegEx (Javascript) The regular expression used by the front-end components for password validation.
Default: ^[\S]{5,30}$
PasswordJavaReg
ExViolationErrorMsg
password_java_reg
ex_violation_error_msg
Password RegEx Violation Error Message Error message when the Password is not matched with passwordJavaRegEx
Default: Password length should be within 5 to 30 characters
RolenameJavaRegEx rolename_java_regex Role Name RegEx (Java) The regular expression used by the back-end components for role name validation. By default, strings with non-empty characters have a length of 3 to 30 allowed. You can provide ranges of alphabets, numbers and also ranges of ASCII values in the RegEx properties.
Default: [a-zA-Z0-9._\-|//]{3,30}$
PasswordHashMethod password_hash_method Password Hashing Algorithm

Specifies the Password Hashing Algorithm used the hash the password before storing in the user store.
Possible values:
SHA - Uses SHA digest method. SHA-1, SHA-256
MD5 - Uses MD 5 digest method.
PLAIN_TEXT - Plain text passwords.(Default)

If you just configure as SHA, It is considered as SHA-1, It is always better to configure algorithm with higher bit value as digest bit size would be increased.

Most of the LDAP servers (such as OpenLdap, OpenDJ, AD, ApacheDS and etc..) are supported to store password as salted hashed values (SSHA)
Therefore WSO2IS server just wants to feed password into the connected user store as a plain text value. Then LDAP user store can store them as salted hashed value. To feed the plain text into the LDAP server, you need to set PasswordHashMethod to “PLAIN_TEXT”
But; if your LDAP does not support to store user password as hashed values. You can configure WSO2 server to hash the password and feeds the hashed password into the LDAP server. Then you need to configure PasswordHashMethod property with SHA (SHA-1), SHA-256, SHA-512. Please note WSO2 server cannot create a salted hashed password (SSHA) to feed into the LDAP.

MultiAttributeSeparator multi_attribute_separator Multiple Attribute Separator This property is used to define a character to separate multiple attributes. This ensures that it will not appear as part of a claim value. Normally “,” is used to separate multiple attributes, but you can define ",,," or "..." or a similar character sequence
Default: “,”
MaxUserName
ListLength
max_user_name
_list_length
Maximum User List Length Controls the number of users listed in the user store of a WSO2 product. This is useful when you have a large number of users and don't want to list them all. Setting this property to 0 displays all users.
Default: 100

In some user stores, there are policies to limit the number of records that can be returned from the query. Setting the value 0 it will list the maximum results returned by the user store. If you need to increase that you need to set it in the user store level.
Eg : Active directory has the MaxPageSize property with the default value 1000.
MaxRoleName
ListLength
max_role_name
_list_length
Maximum Role List Length

Controls the number of roles listed in the user store of a WSO2 product. This is useful when you have a large number of roles and don't want to list them all. Setting this property to 0 displays all roles.
Default: 100

In some user stores, there are policies to limit the number of records that can be returned from the query, Setting the value 0 it will list the maximum results returned by the user store. If you need to increase that you need to set it n the user store level.

Eg: Active directory has the MaxPageSize property with the default value 1000.

kdcEnabled kdc_enabled Enable KDC If your user store is capable of acting as a Kerberos, Key Distribution Center (KDC) and if you like to enable it, set this property to true.
Default: false
UserRoles
CacheEnabled
user_roles
_cache_enabled
Enable User Role Cache This is to indicate whether to cache the role list of a user.
Default: true

Possible values:
false: Set it to false if the user roles are changed by external means and those changes should be instantly reflected in the Carbon instance.
Default: true
ConnectionPooling
Enabled
connection_pooling
_enabled
Enable LDAP Connection Pooling Define whether LDAP connection pooling is enabled
Possible values:
True: Enable connection pooling. Enabling it will improve the performance
False: Disable connection pooling
Default: false
LDAPConnectionTimeout ldap_connection_timeout LDAP Connection Timeout Timeout in making the initial LDAP connection. This is configured in milliseconds.
Default: 5000
ReadTimeout read_timeout LDAP Read Timeout The value of this property is the read timeout in milliseconds for LDAP operations. If the LDAP provider cannot get a LDAP response within that period, it aborts the read attempt. The integer should be greater than zero. An integer less than or equal to zero means no read timeout is specified which is equivalent to waiting for the response infinitely until it is received.
Default: not configured
MembershipAttributeRange membership_attribute_range Membership Attribute Range

This is to define the maximum users of role returned by the LDAP/AD user store. This does not depend on the max page size of the user store.

Default: not configured

RetryAttempts retry_attempts Retry Attempts Retry the authentication request if a timeout happened

Default: not configured

LDAPConnection
Timeout
ldap_connection
_timeout
LDAP Connection Timeout If the connection to the LDAP is inactive for the length of time (in milliseconds) specified by this property, the connection will be terminated.

Default: not configured


Sample: 20

Updating the system administrator

The admin user is the super tenant that will be able to manage all other users, roles, and permissions in the system by using the management console of the product. Therefore, the user that should have admin permissions is required to be stored in the user store when you start the system for the first time. Since the LDAP user store can be written to, you have the option of creating a new admin user in the user store when you start the system for the first time. Alternatively, you can also use a user ID that already exists in the LDAP. For information about the system administrator user, see Configuring the System Administrator.

These two alternative configurations can be done as explained below.

  • If you are using a user that is already in the LDAP. Find a valid user that already resides in the user store. For example, say a valid username is AdminSOA.Add the following configuration to the deployment.toml as shown below. You do not have to update the password element as it is already set in the user store.

    [super_admin]
    username = "AdminSOA"
    admin_role = "admin"
    create_admin_account = false
  • if you are creating a new admin user in the user store when you start the system. you can add the super tenant user to the user store. Add the following configuration to the deployment.toml as shown below.

    [super_admin]
    username = "AdminSOA"
    admin_role = "admin"
    create_admin_account = true
    password = admin
Top