Author: Rajesh Rajasekharan

ForgeRock OpenIG: Getting Credentials from ForgeRock OpenAM

In this episode, you’ll see how ForgeRock OpenIG picks up user credentials from ForgeRock OpenAM, and gives the user access to an application. Now that’s quite a bit of information in a single line. So let’s break it down into pieces:

– A user tries to access ‘http://openig.mydomain.com:8080/replay’ url
– A Java EE OpenAM Policy Agent sitting in front of the ‘http://openig.mydomain.com:8080’ url intercepts the request from the client (user’s browser) and redirects the request to ForgeRock OpenAM (http://openam.mydomain.com:8080/openam)
– ForgeRock OpenAM will send the OpenAM Login Page back to the user
– The user supplies the credential, which the OpenAM verifies. If authentication is successful,OpenAM adds the username of the user and his/her encrypted password to the session and sends it to Java EE Policy Agent
– Java EE Policy agent validates the user’s session, gives control to OpenIG.
– Because the URL that the client requested for (http://openig.mydomain.com:8080/replay), matches a specific route (say 04-route.json) configured in OpenIG, it applies the filters in the route configuration file. The first filter will use a shared key (also known to the OpenAM) to decrypt the encrypted password sent by OpenAM. The second filter will retrieve the username and password from the exchange and replaces your browser’s original HTTP GET request with an HTTP POST login request that contains the credentials to authenticate and the third filter will remove the username and password headers before continuing to process the exchange.
– The HTTP server validates the credentials and respond back to OpenIG with user’s profile page
– OpenIG sends that response to the end user
A couple of things though: OpenAM in our setup is configured to process a ‘Password Replay’ Java Class on successful authentication. The Java EE agent in OpenAM is configured only for Single Sign On (SSO) and is configured to add the UserToken (username) and sunIdentityUserPassword (password) as session attributes in HTTP header.

The picture below may not speak thousand words, but it does speak all the words I uttered above:

OpenIGWithOpenAM

If you’re new to ForgeRock OpenIG, I recommend viewing screen-casts at the following links first:
– ForgeRock OpenIG Installation & Configuration
– ForgeRock OpenIG: Getting Credentials from File Data Source
– ForgeRock OpenIG: Getting Credentials from JDBC Data Source

The following video would not have been possible, but with the help of ForgeRock Documentation.

Enjoy!

ForgeRock OpenIDM: Setting Up SSL With MySQL Internal Repository

If you’ve already seen the video demonstration on setting up ForgeRock OpenIDM to use a JDBC repository, you may now be interested to know how to secure the traffic from ForgeRock OpenIDM to its JDBC repository. So in the video that follows, you will see:

– Setting up SSL in MySQL database
– Configuring OpenIDM to use SSLto the MySQL database (its internal repository)
Like several other videos that I’ve already published on this blog space around ForgeRock products, this one also makes use of Ubuntu 14.10 host 0S. A Linux Container running Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS is where we’ve our ForgeRock OpenIDM and MySQL database running. The illustration below might help you get a quick picture about the infrastructure used for the screen-cast:

OpenIDMwithSSLtoJDBC-01
Hope you’ll find the video log useful:

Thanks
MySQL Product Documentation
ForgeRock Documentation

Setting Up ForgeRock OpenAM with HTTPS on Tomcat

This post is a demo version of the ForgeRock Documentation on Setting Up OpenAM with HTTPS on Tomcat. I had earlier published a screen-cast on the ForgeRock OpenAM deployment and Configuration on a Apache Tomcat Container running in a LXC. If you haven’t watched it yet, and would like to have a look at it, it’s right here. Below you’ll find the steps that I run in my Ubuntu Linux Container to secure our OpenAM deployment:

– Create a Certificate & store it in keystore in a Linux Container
– Modify the Tomcat Server Configuration file (server.xml) to enable SSL (on port 8443)
– Deploy ForgeRock OpenAM
– Access OpenAM from the host OS and complete the configuration

If it’s hard for your visualize how the infrastructure looks like, here’s an illustration to make life easy.

OpenAMWithSSL

Now on to the action:

ForgeRock OpenDJ Replication – Enabling Encryption

This is a sequel to my earlier blog update on ForgeRock OpenDJ Replication and is largely inspired by a question raised in the ForgeRock Community Website. So if you are not very familiar with the steps involved in configuring OpenDJ Replication, I suggest you read/watch it before watching the embedded video below:

One-liner about the infrastructure used: two Linux Containers, each running an instance of ForgeRock OpenDJ is already replicating the OpenDJ data, but the replication traffic is not secure. In the video demonstration that follows, we’ll tighten the security a bit by encrypting the replication traffic as well as monitor the same using wireshark running on the host OS. Well, the diagram below indicates the end state of our screen-cast:

OpenDJReplicationEncrypted

Enjoy!

ForgeRock OpenAM Deployment Session in Bangalore, India

A brilliant five day training on ForgeRock OpenAM by Matthias Tristl is reaching its conclusion today in Bangalore. Well, if you want to know what we learned on OpenAM in five days, the details are here. Have a look at the ForgeRock University page for other interesting programs.

Thank you Matthias, we had a lot of learning & fun:

IMG_6695

ForgeRockOpenAMDeploymentTraining_Bangalore

ForgeRock OpenIG: Getting Credentials From JDBC Data Source

This update could be considered a variant of an earlier post around ForgeRock OpenIG. And it’s highly recommended you watch my screen-cast on ‘OpenIG Authentication From File DataStore’ (or the blog update mentioned above) before viewing the video embedded below. As always, for making the video demonstrations that you see below, I just followed the neat instruction from the ForgeRock documentation.

An illustration below for giving you an idea of what’s in store in my 8 minute video:

OpenIGJDBCDatastore
And here’s quick explanation on what’s happening:
step (1) OpenIG intercepts your browser’s HTTP GET request. The request matches the new route configuration (“/sql”)
Step (2) The OpenIG ‘SQLAttributesFilter’ looksup credentials for ‘sholmes@example.com’ in the H2 database
step (3) The ‘SQLAttributesFilter’ stores the credentials fetched in step 2 in Exchange
step (4) The ‘StaticRequestFilter’ retrieves the credentials from Exchange, replaces the original HTTP GET request with HTTP POST login that contains the credentials to authenticate
step (5) OpenIG now sends HTTP POST to the Application (listening on port 8081)
Step (6) The application (on port 8081) validates the authentication credentials and sends the response to OpenIG
step (7) The OpenIG now sends the response to the client (which happens to be user profile)

Now sit back and enjoy the video:

ForgeRock OpenIDM REST Interface

I’ve already posted some entries around the ForgeRock OpenIDM, direct links to which are appended below in case you are interested:

– ForgeRock OpenIDM Installation In a Linux Container”
– ForgeRock OpenIDM Integration with ForgeRock OpenDJ
– Setting up ForgeRock OpenIDM with MySQL
– Configuring ForgeRock OpenIDM in a Cluster

The following video log is a very light one, partly because I haven’t done a video on REST interface around OpenIDM, but have done similiar ones for both OpenDJ and OpenAM, and partly because I’m feeling too sleepy to do a screen-cast on tougher topics. Talking of REST, in case if you haven’t seen my earlier reference to a neat and curt introduction to ForgeRock Common REST API, read it here.

Again, for those who are not familiar with REST calls to OpenIDM, the embedded video below might just give an idea of how to create a user and fetch a user profile in OpenIDM using REST.

Configuring Database as OpenAM Log Type

That the ForgeRock OpenAM audit logs are extremely important is an understatement. By default, OpenAM uses flat files as log output format, but there does exist an option to configure OpenAM to generate audit logs onto a database. And when a friend today raised a question around it, I thought I should make a screen-cast on it, which is what you would find embedded below.

A bit about the system used for the screen-cast. I’m running two Linux Containers (Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS), one of which has OpenAM installed & configured and the other container running an instance of MySQL database. Rest of the story should be straightforward in the video.

Special Thanks: David Goldsmith

ForgeRock OpenDJ Backup And Restore

I’ll keep this one short. Below you’ll find a screen-cast on ForgeRock OpenDJ backup and restoration commands. A detailed documentation on backup and restoration in OpenDJ can be found at ForgeRock documentation site.

Other blog entries (video logs) related to OpenDJ are appended below:

– ForgeRock OpenDJ Installation In a Linux Container
– ForgeRock OpenIDM Integration with ForgeRock OpenDJ
– Creating Realm in ForgeRock OpenAM and Configuring ForgeRock OpenDJ as a Data Store
– ForgeRock OpenDJ Replication Across Linux Containers
– RESTful Operations on ForgeRock OpenDJ

ForgeRock OpenAM High Availability Deployment

A video demonstration on ForgeRock OpenAM deployment as a standalone instance in a Tomcat Server was posted earlier on my blog. For a production ready environment, it is important to have multiple instances of OpenAM running in a site. In the video that’s embedded below, you’ll get to see:

– An existing deployment of ForgeRock OpenAM in a Linux Container
– Installation & Configuration of a new instance of ForgeRock OpenAM in a separate Linux Container joining an existing OpenAM deployment
– Configuration of a OpenAM site that includes two OpenAM instances as mentioned above
– Installation and Configuration of HA Proxy in a separate Linux Container
– Demonstration of load balancing by HA Proxy to the back end OpenAM Servers

A great deal of information required for doing a demonstration on OpenAM HA environment and in turn the rules to be used by the HA Proxy was picked up from Mark Craig’s blog.

The illustration below might give an idea on the infrastructure used in the video demonstration. There are three Linux Containers in a Ubuntu 14.10 host, one of which has the first instance of OpenAM, the second one has another instance of OpenAM and the third one running HA Proxy to load balance the requests to two instances of OpenAM. The client requests go to the Linux Container running HA Proxy, from where the HA Proxy redirects the requests to either one of the OpenAM instances running in two different Linux Containers.

If you’ve got some some bit of idea looking at the illustration above, I can assure you, it’ll be clearer watching the demonstration below. A word of caution though: the infrastructure used here is only for demonstration purpose, for a very serious highly available environment, you may have to consider other virtualization technologies.

Enjoy!

ForgeRock OpenIG: Getting Credentials From File Data Source

If you’ve not heard of ForgeRock OpenIG or haven’t gone through its Installation & Configuration procedure, I’d request you to either view my earlier post on ForgeRock OpenIG Installation & Configuration or read through the ‘Getting Started on OpenIG’ guide.This post picks up from there…

This update is based on the official ForgeRock documentation section here. The intent is only to give a demonstration of what is already written in there.

The screen-cast embedded at the end of this post, demonstrates how ForgeRock OpenIG intercepts a HTTP GET request from a client, process the request based on filter, handlers & conditions defined in its configuration files, redirect the HTTP GET request either as it is, or replacing it with other HTTP methods like POST to a HTTP server and then redirect the response that HTTP Server gives back to the client who originally invoked the request. Now, that was probably one of the lengthiest sentences, you would ever encounter. They say, picture speak a thousand words, so I’ll have you look at the following illustration, which by and large, summarizes a mouthful of words that I mentioned above:

You’re not supposed to understand the whole story by looking at the illustration above. For you to go get a clear picture of what I’m trying to convey, I’ve the following video log:

Enjoy!

Configuring ForgeRock OpenIDM In a Cluster

On this site, I’ve written another couple of posts around ForgeRock OpenIDM. If you’re not familiar with OpenIDM, I’d recommend reading/watching those (mentioned below), before viewing the video log embedded at the end of this post.

– ForgeRock OpenIDM Installation In a Linux Container
– Forge Rock OpenIDM with MySQL

Video logs on the links above are quite detailed, but if you’ve not much time to spare to watch all of it, not to worry, the installation of OpenIDM and configuration of MySQL as its internal repository is quickly covered in the following screen-cast as well.

The below illustration might give you a rough idea about the infrastructure that I used to perform the demonstration on OpenIDM Cluster Configuration. I’ve a Host Operating System of Ubuntu 14.10 in which there are many Linux Containers. Two of LXCs named ‘my-openidm’ & ‘my-openidm2’ are used to install two separate instances of ForgeRock OpenIDM (say ‘node1’ & ‘node2’). A directory named ‘/software’ on the Host OS that has all required binaries is shared as ‘/source’ inside the Linux Containers. For brevity, I’ve included only the relevant LXCs in the illustration as follows:

Please use the embedded video for a quick reference. For a detailed study on how the OpenIDM works in a cluster, please refer to the ForgeRock documentation.

Enjoy!

RESTful Operations on ForgeRock OpenDJ

In an earlier blog update we saw how we could interact with ForgeRock OpenAM using REST. In this episode, we’ll look at the RESTful Operations on ForgeRock’s Directory Services solution OpenDJ. If you’re like me, you would have probably used commands like ‘ldapsearch’, ‘ldapmodify’ to operate on the Directory Server data, but may not have tried alternate ways of interacting with the product. In the screen-cast below, let’s explore how REST calls can be made instead of LDAP on to an OpenDJ instance to perform some of basic Directory Services operation. For a detailed study on the topic, I’d always recommend ForgeRock documentation on the topic.

Enjoy!

ForgeRock OpenAM Authentication with Google Account Using OAuth2

ForgeRock OpenAM supports a number of Authentication Modules that can be used to verify the identity of a user attempting to login to the applications protected by OpenAM. One of the biggest strengths of OpenAM is the flexibility that it gives to plug in a Custom Authentication Module in the event the Out of The Box modules do not meet the requirements. Some details around the same can be found here.

In the following video that has a running time of approximately nine minutes, you’ll see an OpenAM instance being configured to contact Google for identifying a user by using OAuth2. Google’s literature about their support for OAuth2 is here in case if you are interested to read.

Enjoy!

Creating OpenAM Realm Using REST

In an earlier post we saw how to create a new realm in ForgeRock OpenAM. But for that we used the Browser User Interface of OpenAM. Well it’s likely that the ForgeRock customers might not be interested in ForgeRock’s implementation of User Interface, but would like to have their own custom way of interacting with the product. For this very purpose, all components of ForgeRock Identity Platform offers easy-to-use RESTful Web API. A neat introduction about it is here. For a detailed look on the RESTful Web Services, I’d recommend ForgeRock documentation.

So in the following screen-cast, we’ll see how we can use a popular command line tool to make REST calls to the OpenAM first for performing authenticaiton and then for creating a realm.

Creating Realm in OpenAM and Configuring OpenDJ as a Data Store

I’ve tried my level best to keep this post as complete in itself as possible to be able to go through without having to read/watch any of my earlier posts/video logs. So while it is not strictly required to read/watch my earlier posts/video logs on this blog to go through this one, at least to understand the infrastructure used, it’s desired that you take a look at a couple of my earlier posts on OpenAM and OpenDJ at the links below:

– ForgeRock OpenDJ Installation In a Linux Container
– ForgeRock OpenAM Installation In a Linux Container

Here’s what you can expect from the screen-cast below

– Creating new realm in OpenAM
– Understanding OpenAM realm based Authentication
– Configuring OpenDJ as a Data Store for the OpenAM realm

Enjoy!

Setting Up ForgeRock OpenIDM with MySQL

ForgeRock OpenIDM comes bundled with OrientDB. But the use of OrientDB as an internal repository for OpenIDM is not recommended in a production environment. A list of supported JDBC repositories for production use with OpenIDM can be found here. In this post, you’ll find a screen-cast that demonstrates the configuration of MySQL as an internal repository for OpenIDM. The following video log, however, does not demonstrate the installation of OpenIDM, but if interested you can watch the OpenIDM installation here.

The following screen-cast is based on the ForgeRock OpenIDM documentation section

ForgeRock OpenDJ Replication Across Linux Containers

I’ve already posted an entry on ForgeRock OpenDJ Installation in a Linux Container. If interested, you can read/watch it here. If you are already familiar with OpenDJ installation as a stand alone Directory Server instance and would like to know the very simple steps involved in setting up data replication, the following video log might be useful for you. The screen-cast below uses two OpenDJ instances running on two different Linux Containers to set up data replication. A great deal of information required for performing this demo was fetched from Ludo’s Sketches. ForgeRock Documentation that talks of OpenDJ Data Replication can be found here.

Sit back, relax, watch & enjoy!

ForgeRock OpenIG Installation & Configuration in a Linux Container

ForgeRock has four main products: OpenDJ, OpenAM, OpenIDM and OpenIG. A few days back I embarked on a journey to publish posts on my blog that demonstrated basic functionality of each of the aforesaid products. This post, it’s safe to say, might be the one leading to the chequered flag. So here’s the story so far:

– ForgeRock OpenDJ Installation in a Linux Container
– ForgeRock OpenAM Installation in a Linux Container
– ForgeRock OpenIDM Installation in a Linux Container
– ForgeRock OpenIDM Integration with ForgeRock OpenDJ

and now to the last one in the series that demonstrates the functionality of OpenIG (Identity Gateway) at a very basic level of course. And as with the last blog entries, I present to you the video logs of OpenIG installation and configuration. The demonstration in the video is based on ForgeRock OpenIG Quick Start documentation.

What you get to see in the video log is:

– Creation of a new Linux Container ‘my-openig’
– Installation of Jetty
– Deployment of OpenIG in Jetty
– Installation of minimal http server
– Configuring the OpenIG to redirect requests to the minimal http server

Enjoy!

ForgeRock OpenIDM Integration with ForgeRock OpenDJ

This post picks up from an earlier one and maybe it makes sense to have look at that first before going through this one. So now that we have ForgeRock OpenIDM running inside a Linux Container, in the video log embedded below, we integrate it with ForgeRock OpenDJ. We’ll then use OpenIDM to provision users on to the OpenDJ. Here’s a summary of what you get to see in the video:

– A quick look at the existing installation of ForgeRock OpenIDM and ForgeRock OpenDJ
– Configuring OpenIDM with LDAP connector during startup using available sample files
– Reconciliation of identifies from ForgeRock OpenDJ to ForgeRock OpenIDM
– Provisioning users from ForgeRock OpenIDM to ForgeRock OpenDJ


More details are available at this section of the OpenIDM documentation

ForgeRock OpenIDM Installation In a Linux Container

Chronologically, this is my third blog update around ForgeRock software stack, the first two being Installation of OpenDJ in a Linux Container and ForgeRock OpenAM Installation in a LXC. While none of these entries have any dependency on each other whatsoever, it is recommended to watch it in order so as to get a fairly uncomplicated idea on the infrastructure being used for demonstrations. In the video logs embedded in all the blog posts as mentioned above, the ForgeRock products are being installed in Linux Containers in Ubuntu Linux flavour that in turn is running in a Virtual Box. Because I thought it maybe relatively effortless for you to sit back and enjoy watching a video rather than reading through a lengthy essay, I’m sticking to my idea of publishing my screen-cast on installation of ForgeRock OpenIDM in a Linux Container. In the screencast, you’ll find:

– Creating new linux container for installation of OpenIDM
– Installation of OpenIDM in a LXC
– Starting/stopping OpenIDM Services
– Accessing OpenIDM using REST calls
– Accessing OpenIDM using BUI
– Configuring OpenIDM as a run control script in Ubuntu Linux

With a hope that this screencast will give you a some understanding on getting started with ForgeRock OpenIDM, I here unto present it for you:


We will figure out how to use OpenIDM for Identity provisioning in a later segment, not too far in the future. In the mean time, if you would like to browse away the features of ForgeRock OpenIDM, its documentation can be found here.

ForgeRock OpenAM – Configuring Policies to Protect Web Applications

In an earlier post we saw the Installation and Configuration of ForgeRock OpenAM and how it protects a Web Based Application. The follow screen-cast, which is an extract from a live session conducted for a ForgeRock Customer takes us through the Policy Configuration in OpenAM so that the Web Application displayes a particular page only to those Users who belong to an OpenDJ group called ‘Employees’:

Enjoy!

ForgeRock OpenAM Installation in a Linux Container

In continuation to my earlier blog on Installing ForgeRock’s OpenDJ in a Linux Container, and to keep up with the promise of doing my bit to introduce ForgeRock’s software stack, I present here another set of video logs that takes you through the deployment of ForgeRock’s Access Management Solution:

– Installation of Apache Web Server in a Linux Container [Video 00]
– Installation of Apache Tomcat Application a Linux Container [Video 01]
– Deploying ForgeRock OpenAM in a Tomcat Application Server [Video 02]
– Protecting Apache Web Server using ForgeRock OpenAM [Video 03]

[Video 00]


[Video 01]


[Video 02]


[Video 03]

ForgeRock OpenDJ Installation in a Linux Container

So after I bid farewell to over a decade long teaching profession, I’ve now joined the band @ ForgeRock. Feels at home, as I now find myself amongst some familiar folks, doing activities on popular open source products on Identity Management that has always been so dear to me.

Without any further ado, let me do my bit to introduce the ForgeRock products to you. To start with, I’ll help you setup ForgeRock’s directory service solution ‘OpenDJ’. Because I’ve a plan to show you the entire ForgeRock product portfolio over the next few weeks, I’ve setup the OpenDJ component in an OS virtualization solution. I’ve my own OS preferences, but for the sake of demonstration, I’ve decided to use the freely available Ubuntu OS. And in Ubuntu, we will create Linux Containers (a.k.a LXC), light weight OS virtualization solution. Over the next few weeks, we’ll have one container for each of the ForgeRock product.

Rather than writing a lengthy essay on the steps to create/configure Linux containers (LXC) and then install/configure ForgeRock’s OpenDJ, I’ve decided to publish my video logs here, which I think might turn out to be more convenient for you sit back and watch.

So here’s what I’ve done:
– Installed Ubuntu 14.04 LTS on a VirtualBox. [Video 00]
– Performed Package updates post installation.[Video 01]
– Installed the packages required for creating LXC.[Video 01]
– Installed the LXC Web Console package (to access LXC using BUI). [Video 01]
– Upgraded the host OS from 14.04 to 14.10 [not shown in the video]
– Cloned the LXC to create a new Linux Container for installing ForgeRock’s OpenDJ. [Video 02]
– Downloaded the OpenDJ software. [Video 02]
– Installed / Configured OpenDJ in a Linux Container [Video 02]

In case you are familiar with the Linux and Linux Container installation, feel free to skip the video 00 and video 01. Please also note that video recording was paused during the lengthy package installation procedure, which otherwise would have put you to sleep.

Video 00

Video 01

Video 02

For a detailed introduction on OpenDJ, watch this video

“We are explorers, Rom”

After over a decade, I’ve come to a bend in the road, which while I’m super excited to take and move along, makes me leave behind all familiar scenes of classrooms full of learning and fun. That I’ve only fond memories of most part of my teaching profession at Sun and then at Oracle is with no tinge of exaggeration. And sure enough, I wouldn’t be willing to trade the bygone decade of my life for anything.

“We are explorers, Rom,” says Cooper, an astronaut in legendary Christopher Nolan’s epic movie Interstellar. Starting the 01st of July 2015, I’m setting out to explore a novel territory in my Professional life, bidding farewell to a passionate job that I’ve been actively engaged in for around a dozen years now.

And at a juncture as important as this one the most prominent of feelings emerging from within, beyond doubt, is that of gratitude. Grateful, in many ways, to the wonderful human beings whom I’ve chanced upon in the Sun/Oracle classrooms for discussions on broad spectrum of technologies. Barring a handful of events, every single episode that I can think of has only given me good friends, pleasant memories, profound learning & great inspiration. If life is an accumulation of many moments, I’d say, I’ll remain eternally grateful to all who stopped by my class for filling in an important slice of my life with many a sweet moment.

But for all of the above to have happened, someone had to hire me first. I’ll never get tired of being thankful to the person who kindly offered me a grand opportunity at Sun and to have given me the freedom, all the way, to do the job my way. Cannot also forget ever, the support and guidance of my superiors at Oracle, who bestowed in me an unwavering confidence, leading me to expand my knowledge base well beyond my comfort zone.

I can’t of course make the mistake of forgetting to mention here the kindness of leaders from various other business units within Sun/Oracle in extending to me fabulous opportunities for participation in activities not directly related to my work, yet those that turned so crucial in aiding me produce consistent quality output. I’ve had the fortune of working with some of the brilliant minds in the Industry whose undying positive attitude has always been and shall remain a source of inspiration.

I’ve an immaculate faith in the force that has bound us all, therefore to draw curtain to a chapter as grandeur as this one without reflecting on its grace may not be an act of wisdom.

Of late I’ve been quite struggling with my basic French lessons. A weak vocabulary and with a pronunciation that probably sounds awful, I really can’t say much in French; but I’ve equipped myself with a phrase that might just fit in as a closing statement to his note of gratitude. Toute les bonnes choses ont une fin.

Gratefully yours,

–R Rajesh

Solaris & MySQL Courses

In the last few weeks, I had the opportunity to take a couple of customized courses on Solaris & MySQL. Here, meet my friends:


A customized four day program on Transition to Solaris 11 based on Solaris 11.2 from 09/Jun – 12/Jun 2015 in Bangalore


A five day program on Solaris 11 Network Administration at Hyderabad during the last week of May 2015.


A five day customized program on MySQL for Database Administrators & MySQL for Developers at a client location in Bangalore from May 11 – 15 2015.

For details around the Solaris certification, click here. For information on MySQL certification, go here.

Solaris 11 Zones & ZFS Sessions in Hyderabad

My last week’s engagement on OU programs around Solaris 11 zones and Solaris 11 ZFS at Hyderabad concluded on Saturday. Thanks to each of the training delegates in the picture below for active participation and co-operation during the program.

Last but not least, heart felt gratitude to them for throwing a surprise advance birthday bash!

Oracle FS1 Flash Storage Training in Bangalore

Just last week, I met up with some of my colleagues from the field to have a five day long discussion on Oracle FS1 Flash Storage.

I have to mention here how grateful we are to Bhava Sinkandar for offering us great support throughout the program. Glad he joined us for the following picture.


Oracle partners and internals can get more details about the Oracle University program around FS1-2 storage here.

Transition to Solaris 11 Session at Hyderabad

With a number of networking features introduced and enhanced in the Solaris 11.2 release, it was quite an engaging session last week on ‘Transition to Solaris 11’.

Find more details about Solaris 11 here.

Before I forget, let me mention here that those who take up Instructor Led Training Programs or Live Virtual Classes from Oracle University is eligible for a free trail on Oracle Learning Streams. Details about it can be found here

Wishing a Grand Year 2015

In essence, this is a Thank You note! Just that to do so, I’m leveraging strategic part of the Calendar Year. Like the previous years, I say again that I don’t nurture any expectation to see my life going down a new road full of roses & only roses just coz starting tomorrow I’d have a new calendar to look at. Most of us know life incessantly offers varying flavours of experience, be it the first month of an Year or the last one; it hardly makes a difference. I hesitate to believe that we ought to wait to flip through a dozen months on our calendar to adminster a positive change in life. As they say it can be “Here and Now” not necessarily post a New Year Party hangover.

Well, then that begs an explanation of why I’m doing what I’m doing now: (i) historically, I’ve shown up at this time of the year, every year, to reinforce our connection and I continue to love doing that (ii) all of us tend to be in a reflective mood around this period, taking stock of all moments in the last twelve months that would have made our Mom feel proud, some otherwise, as well to beg forgiveness for the mistakes committed, also to thank God for giving strength to accept life’s event with a sense of equanimity. As much as I wish to express my heartfelt gratitude to you on a daily basis, it might seem a rather weird act, so it’s perhaps best done at a juncture as this one, when we all of us seem to stay in such thoughtful mood.

So, thank you to have chosen to connect with me one way or the other, more so for maintaining it. Thank God for making that happen. I want you to know that I’ve been hugely benefitted by the company you offered, by the kind help rendered on occasions innumerable. Packaged alongside this expression of gratitude is also my best wishes to you for a grand Year 2015, add to it my prayers for a balanced life.

Rock the Year 2014 Farewell party, and have a marvelous Year 2015!

Oracle VM Administration: Oracle VM for x86 training at Thiruvananthapuram

On a Christmas eve, parted with the folks in the picture below after concluding a three day Oracle University program on Oracle VM Server for x86 at their company location in Thiruvanthapuram.

For those interested in knowing the details of three day program on Oracle VM Server for x86, please find it here.

Merry Christmas to all!

A 12 day marathon

Just this Friday, I concluded a 12 day continous program for two batches from one of the Oracle Customers on two different Oracle University Courses around Solaris 11 and Oracle VM for SPARC.


Batch I: 08 – 13 December 2014

Batch II : 14 – 19 December 2014
If you are interested in the details of course that they attended from 08 Dec to 19 Dec 2014, you can find it here and here.

Oracle Directory Server Enterprise Edition 11g: Maintenance & Operations Training

Just yesterday, I concluded a training program on Oracle Directory Server Enterprise Edition 11g: Maintenance & Operations training in Bangalore. Meet my new friends:

To find a list of training programs available from Oracle University around Directory Servers, please navigate to this link.Here you’ll get a list of all training programs around Oracle Identity Management Products. And if you are looking for download location of Oracle Identity Management products, that’s right here.

Solaris 11 DTrace Session at Hyderabad

I owe a special one to Brendan Gregg and Jim Mauro for their classic work on DTrace, which made my life easy at Hyderabad while delivering a three day OU course on Solaris 11 DTrace for a bunch of my friends from IBM. That they were mind blown by some of the DTrace scripts picked up from the very famous DTrace Book is gratefully acknowledged by each one of them.

Solaris Cluster Advanced Administration Training

Want to know how to build a custom data service agent in Solaris Cluster and also use the Geographic Edition of the product? Attend an Oracle University training program titled Solaris Cluster Advanced Administration, a lab intensive 5 day event based on the 4.x version of Solaris Cluster.

Have a look a rather huge batch who attended this program last week at Hyderabad.

Sun ZFS Storage 7000 Appliance Administration Training

Class photograph from last week’s Sun ZFS Storage 7000 Appliance Administration training at Bangalore.

Some useful links around the ZFS Storage 7000 appliance is below:

Administration Guide [Opens a PDF]

Download the ZFS Appliance Simulator here.

Know about Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage System Essentials Exam here.

Oracle VM for SPARC (formerly LDoms) & MX000 Server Administration Training at Hyderabad

Just last week, I completed back to back training programs on Oracle VM for SPARC (formerly LDoms) & MX000 Server Administration at Hyderabad.

Training details for Oracle VM for SPARC is here and for MX000 Server Administration is here

Good Bye FY’14

As we welcome Fiscal Year 2015 at Oracle, looking forward to an exciting times ahead, let me take a moment to reflect on the last few laps of the FY’14. No better way to do that putting up pictures that speaks thousand words.


A huge batch who attended back to back programs on Solaris 11 Network Administration, Solaris ZFS Administration, Solaris Zone Administration (19 – 30 May 2014) at Hyderabad.


Transition to Solaris 11 session (5-9 May 2014) at Hyderabad.


Exadata Install & Maintenance session (28 April – 2 May 2014) at Singapore.

A Note Of Gratitude

As per the Malayalam Calendar it happened to be my birth star today, and much to my surprise I got a wonderful gift from my friends from the Big Blue who have come for a training program on Solaris Cluster. The following picture will explain it all
:

The following ‘file photograph’ from a class conducted during the second week of March 2014 on Solaris 11 has every single individual who made my day today. I’m grateful to each of them is an understatement.

Before I leave, let me introduce to you some other friends of mine, who came for two separate batches on an OU training around Oracle VM for SPARC last week, one in Bangalore and other at Hyderabad:

Year 2014 so far…

Before it’s too late, let me introduce to you friends I made from the Oracle University Classes in Year 2014:


Transition to Solaris 11 session in Bangalore


Exadata Install & Maintenance session in Singapore.


MySQL for Developers session in Bangalore. For those interested, here’s the detail about newly released MySQL 5.6 Developer Certification Exam.


MySQL for DBA session in Bangalore. Also read about the newly released MySQL 5.6 DBA Certification here.


Solaris 11 Advanced Administration session in Bangalore.

Seasons Greetings & New Year 2014 wishes

I’m a bit early than usual. The intent of course is not to get it done with, but to express myself, before you all get busy with the holiday actions & New Year Celebrations. I’ve never been so fond of New Year hype, because like many of you, I’d think that the positive changes in life can be brought about anytime and not necessarily as a part of New Year resolution. Plus, to tag a Year as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ seems folly, as there never was a major shift in the regular pattern of life everytime I changed my calenders. Life may continue to throw surprises, some pleasant, some not so.

Perhaps a slab of one dozen month is a reasonable checkpoint at which one could engage in self reflection on the progress made thus far. In that sense, let’s hope we use this occasion to celebrate the joy in life, leave behind all miserable moments, all the same carrying the learning from it into a fresh set of another twelve months. Personally, the year that’s bidding farewell to us in a handful of days time did make me look a miserable man at times. That’s just one view though. Through a different coloured glass, I realize how profound a learning experience all of them happened to be. My hope is to use all such learning to translate life’s events into positive experiences.

All personal musings aside, I’m here to tell you how grateful I’m for your company. Being connected with you through a channel set up by someone unseen is to me one of my true assets. Thank you for being there and I want you to know that you stand the reason for my smile on situations innumerable. Along with my wishes to you for only happiness in the year to come, my prayers for wisdom to take life as it comes and look at its events with great equanimity. Wish you pleasant holidays and a promising Year 2014!

Solaris 11 Network Virtualization Features – Demo

For those who are interested in getting some useful information on Network Virtualization feature in Solaris 11, I’d recommend some of the demonstrations prepared by my friends at Solaris Curriculum development team in Oracle:


Managing Network Resources Using Oracle Solaris 11
Configuring a Virtual Network Using Oracle Solaris 11.1 – Part1
Configuring a Virtual Network Using Oracle Solaris 11.1 – Part2

For details around Solaris 11 training programs from Oracle University, go here.

Pillar Axiom SAN Storage 5.x Administration Session in Bangalore

Just yesterday, one more session on the Pillar Axiom 600 SAN Storage 5.x Administration concluded in Bangalore. For more details about Pillar Axiom product and to know about an OU offering around the same, please navigate to the following links:


Official Pillar Axiom Page
Oracle University Page for Pillar Axiom Storage Trainings
Oracle Partner Network Page for Pillar Axiom Storage
Pillar Axiom Storage System Essentials Certification


Last but not the least, please meet my new friends:

Some Quick Updates

That I’ve been busy is an understatement. In the last four weeks or so, managed to do programs on technologies ranging from Operating platform to Database to Engineered Systems. In the process I met up with the following folks:


MySQL Training in Noida.


Exadata Training in Singapore.


Solaris 11 Training program at Chennai.

In addition, I had connected with many others, but don’t have their ‘faces’ to show coz I met them on WebEx.

Pillar Axiom 600 SAN Storage Session in Sofia

Just last week I traveled to the city of Sofia in Bulgaria to deliver two back to back OU programs (opens a PDF) on Pillar Axiom 600 SAN Storage. Should I say how much I enjoyed the company of my new friends ~5000 miles away from my home? They are here:

Lastly, but importantly, I have to take a moment to thank these gentlemen in the following photograph for offering me their valuable time in helping me learn a lot about their city. I can’t thank them enough for their support and warm hospitality.

One final final thing: those out there on the look out for validating their skill on Pillar Axiom, check out the available certification exam here.

Pillar Axiom SAN Storage Training in Dubai

Here’s another set of friends I made, who dropped by for a training on Pillar Axiom in Dubai. Many thanks to them for choosing an ou program on the same and more so for helping me capture the below moment:


Like I mentioned earlier, if you’re already a specialist in Pillar storage, consider validating it by getting certified by Oracle.

Solaris Cluster Training in Noida

After a rather long gap, I got a chance again to take platform for delivering one of my favourite training programs around Solaris Cluster. Meet my new friends:

For a detailed list of training programs around Solaris Cluster, click here. Go here to get details around certification program around Solaris Cluster 3.2 version.

A neat article here might help you get started to bring up a two node Solaris cluster using Cluster 4.x.

Oracle Key Manager Training in Australia

Somewhere in Australia I conducted a three day session on OKM, an encryption product. So it comes as no surprise that the batch photograph published below is encrypted for security reason 😉

Learn about Oracle Key Manager and use it to obtain the AES 256 key to decrypt the photo below:

Now, if you find it too hard to pick up OKM on your own, please attend an OU program on the product.

Solaris 11 Advanced Administration Session at Hyderabad

Just yesterday, one more training program on Oracle Solaris 11 concluded at Hyderabad, India. If you haven’t tried Solaris 11 yet, click here to access the image and a host of other resources to help you get started. For information on training on Solaris 11, please see here. If you’ve already attended a training program or would like to validate your knowledge on Solaris 11, please access this link to get details around the Solaris 11 certification programs. Meanwhile, thanks to my friends for showing up again for an OU training program on Oracle technologies:



Have a restful weekend all.