Authentication
Login Authentication is the process of checking usernames and passwords provided at a login form against authorized credentials. It is accomplished by CMS in one of three ways:
- Built-in authentication, which stores user information in the database used for other CMS data storage
- LDAP authentication, accomplished by querying your LDAP-enabled directory server (Active Directory, OpenLDAP, etc.) to retrieve user information.
- Custom login authentication. This authentication is determined by the administrator of the client network. Please consult your network or CMS administrator for more details.
With the built-in authentication, the administrator must create an account for each user from within the CMS before they can access the system. This is accomplished from the 'Users, Groups, and Roles' option in the 'Administration' area.
Using LDAP authentication, on the other hand, the CMS authenticates users against a directory on an LDAP-enabled server (usually separate from the server housing the CMS), which could be a pre-existing directory server. This allows you to maintain users for the CMS and other purposes centrally, without having to create multiple accounts for each user.
A custom authentication will vary depending on the particular circumstances. Typically, there is a single sign-on service, which will authenticate a user against a system separate from Cascade Server. This is usually the same process a user might go through to check organizational email or to use other distributed software.