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iPlanet Calendar Server Administrator's Guide |
Chapter 4 Managing Calendar Server Access Control
iPlanet Calendar Server uses Access Control Lists (ACLs) to determine the access control for calendars, calendar properties, and calendar components such as events and todos (tasks).This chapter contains these sections:
Access Control by Users
Public and Private Events and Tasks Filter
Access Control by Users
The Calendar Server considers the following users when determining access to calendars, calendar properties, and calendar components:
Primary calendar owners
Administrators and superusers
- Primary calendar owners have full access to their own calendars. The Calendar Server does not perform any access control checks for primary owners accessing their own calendars.
Other calendar owners
- An administrator such as icsuser or calmaster, or a superuser such as root, is not subject to access control restrictions and can perform any operation on a calendar or calendar component. For more information, see "Calendar Server Administrators".
anonymous user
- Primary calendar owners can designate other owners for their calendars. The other owner can then act on behalf of the primary owner to schedule, delete, modify, accept, or decline events or todos (tasks) for a calendar.
- The special calendar ID (calid) anonymous can access the Calendar Server using any password, if service.http.allowanonymouslogin in the ics.conf file is set to "yes" (which is the default). The anonymous user is not associated with any particular domain.You can change the calid for the anonymous user by editing the calstore.anonymous.calid parameter.
- You can also view a calendar anonymously if the calendar's permissions allow read access for everybody. For example, the following link allows users to anonymously view the calendar with the calid tchang:meetings (if the calendar's permissions allow read access for everybody):
- http://calendar.sesta.com:8080/?calid=tchang:meetings
- An anonymous user can view, print and search for public events and tasks on the calendar but cannot perform any other operations.
- For information about viewing a resource calendar anonymously, see Linking to a Resource Calendar.
Access Control Lists (ACLs)
The Calendar Server uses access control lists (ACLs) to determine access control for calendars, calendar properties, and calendar components such as events and todos (tasks). An ACL consists of one or more access control entries (ACEs), which are strings that collectively apply to the same calendar or component Each ACE in an ACL must be separated by a semicolon. For example:An ACE consists of the following elements, with each element separated by a caret (^):
Who - The individual, user, domain, or type of user who the ACE applies to.
For example, in the ACE jsmith^c^wd^g:What - The target being accessed, such as a calendar or a calendar component such as an event, todo (task), or calendar property.
How - The type of access control rights permitted, such as read, write, or delete.
Grant - A specific access control right that is either granted or denied.
jsmith is the Who element, indicating who the ACE applies to.
c is the What element, indicating what is being accessed (only the calendar components).
wd is the How element, indicating which access rights are to be granted or denied (write and delete).
g is the Grant element, indicating that the specified access rights, write and delete, for the calendar components are granted to jsmith.
Who
The Who element is the principal value for an ACE and indicates who the ACE applies to, such an individual user, domain, or specific type of user.Who is also called the Universal Principal Name (UPN). The UPN for a user is the user's login name combined with the user's domain. For example, user bill in domain sesta.com has the UPN bill@sesta.com.
Table 4-1 shows the Who formats used in Calendar Server ACEs.
What
The What element specifies the target being accessed, such as a calendar, calendar component (event or task), or calendar property.Table 4-2 shows the What target values used in Calendar Server ACEs.
How
The How element specifies the type of access control rights permitted, such as read, write, or delete.Table 4-3 shows the How types of access control rights used in Calendar Server ACEs.
Grant
The Grant element specifies whether to grant or deny access for a specified access type, such as d (delete) or r (read).Table 4-4 shows the Grant attribute values used in Calendar Server ACEs.
Table 4-4    Grant Values for Access Control Entry (ACE) Strings
Value
Description
Examples of ACEs
The following examples show the use of ACEs:
Grant the user ID jsmith read access to the entire calendar, including both components and properties:
Grant jsmith write and delete access to components only:
- jsmith^a^r^g
Grant all users in the sesta.com domain privileges to schedule, availability, and read access to components only:
- jsmith^c^wd^g
Grant other owners write and delete access to components only:
- @sesta.com^c^sfr^g
Deny jsmith all access to calendar data:
- @@o^c^wd^g
Grant all owners read, schedule, and availability access to the entire calendar, including both components and properties:
- jsmith^a^sfdwr^d
Grant read access to all users:
- @@o^a^rsf^g
- @^a^r^g
Placing ACEs in an ACL
When the Calendar Server reads an ACL, it uses the first ACE it encounters that either grants or denies access to the target. Thus, the ordering of an ACL is significant, and ACE strings should be ordered such that the more specific ones appear before the more general ones.For example, suppose the first ACE in an ACL for the calendar jsmith:sports grants read access to all owners and user bjones is one of the owners. Then, the Calendar Server encounters a second ACE that denies bjones read access to this calendar. In this case, the Calendar Server grants bjones read access to this calendar and ignores the second ACE because it is a conflict. Therefore, to ensure that an access right for a specific user such as bjones is honored, the ACE for bjones should be positioned in the ACL before more global entries such as an ACE that applies to all owners of a calendar.
Configuration Parameters for Access Control
Table 4-5 describes the configuration parameters in the ics.conf file that the Calendar Server uses for access control. For more information see Chapter 8 "Calendar Server Configuration."
Public and Private Events and Tasks Filter
When creating a new event or task, a user can specify whether the event or task is Public, Private, or Time and Date Only (confidential):
PublicAnyone with read permission to the user's calendar can view the event or task.
The calstore.filterprivateevents determines whether the Calendar Server filters (recognizes) Private and Time and Date Only (confidential) events and tasks. By default this parameter is set to "yes". If you set calstore.filterprivateevents to "no", the Calendar Server treats Private and Time and Date Only events and tasks as if they are Public.PrivateOnly owners of the calendar can view the event or task.
Time and Date Only (confidential)Owners of the calendar can view the event or task. Other users with read permission to the calendar can see only "Untitled Event" on the calendar, and the title is not an active link.
Command-Line Utilities for Access Control
The Calendar Server provides the following command-line utilities to allow you to set or modify ACLs for access control:
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Copyright © 2002 Sun Microsystems, Inc. All rights reserved.
Last Updated January 22, 2002