David Kennedy, UMD

Shibboleth and Library Resources

Internet2 Library/Shibboleth Project

David Kennedy, UMD

What is the Library/Shibboleth Project?

• Established 2007

• Five universities + Internet2

• Campus IT, Library IT, Librarians

David Kennedy, UMD

Library concerns with Shibboleth enabled electronic resources

• Communication with campus IT

• Privacy•Privacy with individual vendors•Privacy across vendors•Session persistence

• Walk-in users

• Library patron database integration

David Kennedy, UMD

Electronic resources background

• Ten years of growth• Prevalence of home computing• Increase in distance education• Convenience and user expectation• Hundreds of vendors, thousands of resources• Significant part of the library collection budget• Access and use restrictions• Substantial work to integrate this seamlessly

David Kennedy, UMD

Electronic resource challenges

• Remote access is problematic

• Maintaining IPs is time consuming and unreliable

David Kennedy, UMD

Focus of Library/Shibboleth

• Access control and licensed electronic resources

• Identify user scenarios

• Document business practice and technology issues

• Test solutions

David Kennedy, UMD

Technologies

• Shibboleth

• EZproxy

• mod_auth_location

David Kennedy, UMD

What is Shibboleth?

• Open source standards-based web single sign-on package

• Leverages local identity management system • Enables access to campus and external

applications• Protects users’ privacy• Helps your service partners• Plays well with others

David Kennedy, UMD

Shibboleth’s benefits

• Single sign on

• E-resource personalization

• Usage statistics

• Reduction in trouble tickets

David Kennedy, UMD

What is EZproxy?

• Server side proxy (URL rewriting)

• Proxy access for off-campus resources

• Inexpensive

• Library-focused

• SSO authentication

David Kennedy, UMD

EZproxy’s benefits

• On/off campus consistency

• Persistent URL

• Hybrid solution

• Single place where you point your URLs!

• Simple URL creation

David Kennedy, UMD

What is mod_auth_location?

• Apache module

• Guest authentication by location (IP)

• Used in conjunction with Shib

David Kennedy, UMD

mod_auth_location’s benefits

• Local IP management

• Walk in user

limitations

• Override “guest” access

David Kennedy, UMD

What are the benefits?

Benefits to users• Single sign on• Personalization

Benefits to librarians•Manage IP’s locally (mod_auth_location)• Support

Benefit to library administration• Tracking of usage

David Kennedy, UMD

Maryland as Case Study

• Implemented Shibboleth 2005

• Shibboleth enabled library services•Metalib, Aleph, ILLiad, EZproxy, (SFX)

• SSO with electronic resources

• Persistent URLs though EZproxy

• Campus integration projects• Blackboard, Portal

David Kennedy, UMD

What can you do?

• Get EZproxy!• Implement Shibboleth locally• Explore local issues and concerns with

your library• Pilot existing SSO vendors• Discuss interest in SSO to commercial

vendors

David Kennedy, UMD

Next steps – Library/Shibboleth Project

• Recommending best practices and solutions to common use cases

• Conducting pilots to validate approaches• Encourage adoption of Shibboleth by US

institutions and libraries• Community information sharing

David Kennedy, UMD

Shibboleth-enabled information providers

• American Chemical Society• Atlas (ILLiad/ARES)• Atypon• CSA• EBSCO• Elsevier Science Direct• Ex Libris• EZprozy• JSTOR• Literary Encyclopedia

• OCLC WorldCAT• OVID/SilverPlatter• Project MUSE• Proquest• Safari (underway)• SCRAN• Serials Solutions• Springer• Thomson Gale• Thomson ISI (underway)

David Kennedy, UMD

More information

https://spaces.internet2.edu/display/InCCollaborate/Library+Pilot

davekenn@umd.edu