Preparing the Informix® DBMS for Kerberos authentication

Configure your login process and user authentication to function with a Kerberos 5 mechanism before you set up Informix® for single sign-on.

Before you begin

Informix® SSO requires installation and setup of a Kerberos 5 authentication mechanism on the client and server computers of your network. For details on setting up your network according to the Kerberos standard, see the documentation provided with the installed Kerberos product.

About this task

Important: Use a secure computer for the Key Distribution Center to ensure the safety of the passwords and encryption keys. Limit access to specific users and, if possible, do not use the computer for other tasks.

For JDBC Driver client sites, read Configuring JDBC Driver for SSO before you do the following steps.

You must have kadmin privileges (UNIX and Linux) or domain administrator rights (Windows) to complete steps 3, 4, and 5.

Procedure

  1. For sites that are enabling a new Kerberos 5 setup for SSO, run the sample client and server programs if they are available with your Kerberos product. This task helps eliminate setup errors in the network infrastructure.
  2. Verify that the clocks of all computers to be involved with SSO authentication are synchronized. Kerberos typically does not function when there is a clock discrepancy of five minutes or more between computers.
  3. Create the Informix® service and client principals on the Key Distribution Center (KDC) with the kadmin utility (UNIX and Linux) or with Active Directory (Windows). Remember the following rules as you create principals:
    1. All principals to be used with Informix® must be in the same realm or trusted realms.
    2. All principals must map to database server user IDs. For example, if you have user5@payroll.jkenterprises as a principal, user5 must exist as an operating system user and payroll.jkenterprises.com as a fully qualified host name.
  4. UNIX and Linux only: Add the server service principal key to the keytab file and transfer the file to the Informix® host computer.
  5. UNIX and Linux only: Put the keytab file into the default keytab file location.