Consolidating the growing stores of disparate identity data, where increasing numbers of users and applications are the rule rather than the exception, is one of several daunting tasks facing system administrators. The recent Sun white paper Top Three Reasons to Deploy a Virtual Directory, explains why a virtual directory can help solve this task by providing a single consolidated view of disparate identity data to organizations dealing with diverse legacy resources.
Sun offers a virtual directory capability as part of the Sun Java System Directory Server Enterprise Edition solution and it does not require additional licensing or other technology investment. A virtual directory that aggregates user identity information from multiple data repositories and presents a consolidated view of all the information is much faster and more efficient than creating a physical directory infrastructure for that purpose. It also preserves underlying secure IT infrastructures when multiple organizations are involved, since the data is not actually replicated or moved out of its original environment.
The white paper argues that there are three notable reasons to consider a virtual directory:
- 1. Costly identity sprawl that results from running legacy applications that have
different identity attributes
- 2. Aggressive merger-and-acquisition timelines for integration of new identity data
into existing directory structures
- 3. The need to federate faster and deliver services sooner by speeding information
sharing and access to services among collaborating partners
According to Sun, its virtual directory capability solution offers the following specific advantages:
- No need for data synchronization. Synchronization of different data stores (LDAP
and SQL, for example) takes processing time and introduces undesirable data
latency to the process of accessing data from multiple sources.
- Ability to leverage existing directory investments. Because the virtual directory is
a standard component of Suns enterprise directory offering, there is no additional
technology investment required.
- Rapid data consolidation, integration, and federation. Enterprises that are
collaborating to deliver new services can get to market faster because they can
quickly share identity information.
The white paper examines each of these reasons and illustrates how deploying Suns virtual directory successfully addresses each one.
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