Authentication

Operate provides three ways to authenticate:

1. User information stored in Elasticsearch.
2. Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP).
3. IAM Authentication and Authorization

By default, user storage in Elasticsearch is enabled.

User in Elasticsearch

In this mode, the user authenticates with a username and password stored in Elasticsearch.

The Userid , displayName, password, and roles for one user may be set in application.yml:

camunda.operate:
  userId: anUserId
  displayName: nameShownInWebpage
  password: aPassword
  roles:
    - OWNER
    - USER

Currently, only OWNER and/or USER roles are available.

Roles for users

Name	Description
OWNER	Full access
USER	Read only access

On startup of Operate, the user is created if they did not exist before.

By default, two users are created:

• Role OWNER with userId/displayName/password demo/demo/demo.
• Role USER with userId/displayName/password view/view/view.

Add more users directly to Elasticsearch via the index operate-user-<version>_. The password must be encoded with a strong bcrypt hashing function.

LDAP

Enable LDAP

LDAP can only be enabled by setting the Spring profile: ldap-auth.

See the following example for setting the Spring profile as an environmental variable:

export SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE=ldap-auth

Configuration of LDAP

A user can authenticate via LDAP.

The following parameters for connection to an LDAP server should be given:

Parameter name	Description	Example	Required
camunda.operate.ldap.url	URL to an LDAP Server	ldaps://camunda.com/	Yes
camunda.operate.ldap.baseDn	Base domain name	dc=camunda,dc=com	Yes
camunda.operate.ldap.managerDn	Manager domain used by Operate to log into LDAP server to retrieve user information	cn=admin,dc=camunda,dc=com	Yes
camunda.operate.ldap.managerPassword	Password for manager		Yes
camunda.operate.ldap.userSearchFilter	Filter to retrieve user info. The pattern '{0}' is replaced by the given username in the login form.	{0}	No, default is {0}
camunda.operate.ldap.userSearchBase	Starting point for search	ou=Support,dc=camunda,dc=com	No

Configuration of active directory-based LDAP

For an active directory-based LDAP server, the following parameters should be given:

note

The active directory configuration will only be applied when camunda.operate.ldap.domain is given.

Parameter name	Description	Required
camunda.operate.ldap.url	URL to an active directory LDAP server	Yes
camunda.operate.ldap.domain	Domain	Yes
camunda.operate.ldap.baseDn	Root domain name	No
camunda.operate.ldap.userSearchFilter	Used as a search filter	No

IAM

IAM provides authentication and authorization functionality along with user management.

Enable IAM

IAM can only be enabled by setting the Spring profile: iam-auth.

See the following example:

export SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE=iam-auth

Configure IAM

IAM requires the following parameters:

Parameter name	Description	Example value
camunda.operate.iam.issuer	Name/ID of issuer	http://app.iam.localhost
camunda.operate.iam.issuerUrl	Url of issuer (IAM)	http://app.iam.localhost
camunda.operate.iam.clientId	Similar to a username for the application	operate
camunda.operate.iam.clientSecret	Similar to a password for the application.	XALaRPl...s7dL7

We provide two different permissions over IAM: read or write. To configure the authorization, you are required to create two different permissions:

Permission value	Description
read:*	Grants the user the permission to access, view, and read the data in the application.
write:*	Grants the user the permission to perform operations.

Note that the minimum permission needed is read:*. Any user without this permission will have access denied to the application.