SiteMinder IWA support for Browsers

[Rajesh ka]

Hi All,

 

 

We are protecting some of our AD integrated applications with SiteMinder IWA and in all CA documents we are able to see Internet Explorer mentioned as browser for settings and to open the integrated applications.I have below questions on this :-

 

1) Can someone please confirm that IWA integrated applications should only be opened in Internet explorer after the recommended settings?

2) Also, Please let us know what will happen if we open the same application in a browser where the recommended settings are not done( in IE/Chrome/Firefox as well).

3) Suppose the user doesn't have IE in his system and he wants to use the applications as per prior IWA experience , Is this possible?

 

We Have SiteMinder r12.56 sp1 CR4 deployed on windows 2008 OS.

 

rtnmike

 

 

 

Regards,

Ashish Vashistha

[Miquel Gilibert i Sunye]

Hi Ashish

 

The following link may be of help to you

 

https://support.symplified.com/entries/23702866-Enabling-IWA-on-Chrome-or-Firefox

 

It explains how to set up IWA with Firefox or Chrome.

 

In as far a SiteMinder is concerned If IWA is working properly with Siteminder on IE ,this means that your IWA integration is working properly with Siteminder .

 

According to the IWA authentication flow, it is IIS that negotiates the windows authentication, so you need a browser that supports sending windows credentials and that is configured properly to send those credentials automatically. In the documentation, mention is done of the Internet Explorer since this one obviously supports sending credentials automatically.

 

For the rest of the browsers it may be a matter of configuration or of support on the side of the browser vendor. For instance Chrome usually piggybacks on IE settings.

 

Regarding your questions in particular

 

1. The recommended settings in Internet Explorer are made so that windows authentication is passed to IIS automatically.

2. If the settings are not done, the credentials may not be passed correctly to IIS, and it may not be able to authenticate you, so authentication may fail

3. With some proper configuration and depending on the browser this may be possible. However, please bear once again in mind this is not a specific SiteMinder issue.

 

Hope to have helped

Miquel Gilibert

[Rajesh ka]

Thanks Very Much Miquel for your reply!

 

As there will be different settings need to be done for all browsers, I am wondering now if making users to do these settings and integrating apps with IWA would be a good option or not . Also, it will bring lot of support overhead as well in future i guess. Have you seen such implementation anywhere in the past?

 

 

Regards,

Ashish Vashistha

[Miquel Gilibert i Sunye]

I cannot comment much on having seen it as usually implementation details/use cases are outside the scope of my role. Maybe some of the people in the communities may be able to comment more on this.

As an idea, maybe setting up the different browser settings so that they can be  centrally managed (e.g, something like Set up Chrome for Work - Chrome for Work and Education Help ) and pushing the necessary settings, may help.

[Rajesh ka]

Thanks Miquel for all the information provided.

 

Did any community member please confirm if tried SiteMinder IWA for firefox and Chrome? Any help is much appreciated.

 

Thanks,

Ashish Vashistha