This topic describes how to assign users and groups to
roles if you are using WebSphere® Application Server
authorization for Java Platform, Enterprise Edition
(Java EE) roles.
About this task
These steps are common for both installing
an application and modifying an existing application. If the application
contains roles, you see the Security role to user/group mapping link
during application installation and also during application management,
as a link in the Additional properties section.
- Access the administrative console.
Type http://localhost:port_number/ibm/console in a Web browser.
Type http://server_name:port_number/ibm/console in a Web browser.
- Click Applications > Application Types > WebSphere
enterprise applications > application_name .
- Under Detail properties, click Security role to user/group
mapping. A list of all the roles that belong to this
application is displayed. If the roles already have users, or if one
of the special subjects, AllAuthenticatedUsers, AllAuthenticatedInTrustedRealms,
or Everyone is assigned, they display here.
- To assign the special subjects, select either the Everyone or the All Authenticated in Application's Realm option for
the appropriate roles.
- To assign users or groups, select the role. You can select multiple roles at the same time, if the same users
or groups are assigned to all the roles.
- Click Look up users or Look up groups.
- Get the appropriate users and groups from the user registry
by completing the Limit and the Search string fields and by clicking Search. The Limit field limits the number of users
that are obtained and displayed from the user registry. The pattern
is a searchable pattern matching one or more users and groups. For
example, user* lists users like user1, user2. A pattern of
asterisk (*) indicates all users or groups.
Use the limit and the
search strings cautiously so as not to overwhelm the user registry.
When you use large user registries such as Lightweight Directory Access
Protocol (LDAP) where information on thousands of users and groups
resides, a search for a large number of users or groups can make the
system slow and can make it fail. When more entries exist than requests
for entries, a message displays on top of the panel. You can refine
your search until you have the required list.
If the search
string you are using has no matches, a NULL error message is displayed.
This message is informational and does not necessarily indicate an
error, as it is valid to have no entries matching your selected criteria.
- Select the users and groups to include as members of these
roles from the Available field and click >> to add them
to the roles.
- To remove existing users and groups, select them from the Selected field and click <<. When removing
existing users and groups from roles, use caution if those same roles
are used as RunAs roles.
For example, if the user1 user is assigned
to the role1 RunAs role and you try to remove the user1 user from
the role1 role, the administrative console validation does not delete
the user. A user can only be part of a RunAs role if the user is already
in a role either directly or indirectly through a group. In this case,
the user1 user is in the role1 role. For more information on the validation
checks that are performed between RunAs role mapping and user and
group mapping to roles, see Assigning users to RunAs roles.
- Click OK. If any validation problems
exist between the role assignments and the RunAs role assignments,
the changes are not committed and an error message that indicates
the problem displays at the top of the panel. If a problem exists,
make sure that the user in the RunAs role is also a member of the
regular role. If the regular role contains a group that contains
the user in the RunAs role, make sure that the group is assigned to
the role using the administrative console. Follow steps 4 and 5. Avoid
using any process where the complete name of the group, host name,
group name, or distinguished name (DN) is not used.
What to do next
This task is required to assign users and groups to roles,
which enables the correct users and groups to access a secured application.
If you are installing an application, complete your installation.
After the application is installed and running you can access your
resources according to the user and group mapping that you did in
this task. If you manage applications and modify the users and groups
to role mapping, make sure you save, stop, and restart the application
so that the changes become effective. Try accessing the Java EE resources in the application to verify
that the changes are effective.
Note: Depending upon how your active
user registry is configured, the search results of security user
or group role mappings are displayed in different formats. With federated
repository, LDAP, file-based and custom registries can be used. WebSphere Application Server can uniquely
identify users from various registries by the user names listed in
the table.
Attention: In a distributed environment, when you install WebSphere Application Server with samples,
enable security using federated repositories, and start the server1
server with sample applications, the server might create exceptions.
However, the server starts successfully. The deployment manager did
not create user and group samples when it created the deployment manager
profile. To resolve exceptions caused by the samples failing to load,
create your own sample users and groups. In the administrative console,
do the following:
- Click Users and Groups > Manage Users.
- Create the samples user and the sampadmn group.
The samples user is a member of the sampadmn group.
For more assistance, refer to the "Managing users" help topic
by clicking
More information about this page at the top right
of the Manage Users panel.