com.ibm.itim.authentication
Class AuthenticationAuthority

java.lang.Object
  com.ibm.itim.authentication.AuthenticationAuthority

All Implemented Interfaces:

Authenticator

public class AuthenticationAuthority
extends java.lang.Object
implements Authenticator

AuthenticationAuthority is a class that implements the Authenticator interface for authenticating a user that is independent of the authentication mechanism being used. The specific implementation of an authentication mechanism is provided by a AuthenticationProvider. An AuthenticationAuthority is configured to use a specific AuthenticationProvider by specifying the name of an AuthenticationProviderFactory class in the AuthenticationAuthority's constructor environment.

See Also:

AuthenticationProvider, Credentials

Field Summary

static java.lang.String

PROVIDER_FACTORY Constant that holds the name of the environment property for specifying the AuthenticationProvider factory to use.

Fields inherited from interface com.ibm.itim.authentication.Authenticator

KEY, PRINCIPAL, TENANT

Constructor Summary

AuthenticationAuthority(java.util.Hashtable env)
Constructs an AuthenticationAuthority with the given environment.

Method Summary

SystemUser

authenticate(Credentials userCredentials) Authenticates a user with the given Credentials.

Methods inherited from class java.lang.Object

equals, getClass, hashCode, notify, notifyAll, toString, wait, wait, wait

Field Detail

PROVIDER_FACTORY

public static final java.lang.String PROVIDER_FACTORY

Constant that holds the name of the environment property for specifying the AuthenticationProvider factory to use. The value of the property should be the fully qualified class name of the factory class that will create an AuthenticationProvider. This property must be specified in the environment parameter passed to the AuthenticationAuthority constructor. If it is not specified, an AuthenticationException is thrown by the constructor.

See Also:

Constant Field Values

Constructor Detail

AuthenticationAuthority

public AuthenticationAuthority(java.util.Hashtable env)
                        throws ConfigurationException

Constructs an AuthenticationAuthority with the given environment. The PROVIDER_FACTORY environment parameter is required to construct the AuthenticationProvider to be used for authentication.

Parameters:

env - Environment parameters used to construct the AuthenticationAuthority.

Throws:

ConfigurationException - thrown if the AuthenticationAuthority can not be constructed.

Method Detail

authenticate

public SystemUser authenticate(Credentials userCredentials)
                        throws AuthenticationFailedException,
                               ConfigurationException

Authenticates a user with the given Credentials. The types of user credentials passed to the method must match the supported credentials of the AuthenticationProvider configured for the AuthenticationAuthority. If the given credentials are invalid, an AuthenticationFailedException is thrown.

Specified by:

authenticate in interface Authenticator

Parameters:

userCredentials - the user's credentials to be authenticated. The type of credentials supplied must be supported by the configured AuthenticationProvider.

Returns:

SystemUser object representing authenticated user

Throws:

AuthenticationFailedException - thrown if the authentication attempt failed to invalid user credentials.

ConfigurationException - thrown if the required credentials are not provided or the provided credentials are malformed.