Liberty Personal Profile Service Process

The invocation of a personal profile begins when a WSC posts a query or a modify request to the Liberty Personal Profile Service on behalf of a user. Figure 12–9 illustrates the invocation process of the Liberty Personal Profile Service.

Figure 12–9 Liberty Personal Profile Service Process

1. A WSC uses the Data Services Template API uses SOAP to post a query or a modify request to the Liberty Personal Profile Service.

2. The SOAP request is received by the SOAPReceiver servlet provided by the SOAP Binding Service.

   The SOAPReceiver invokes either the Discovery Service, the Authentication Web Service, or the Liberty Personal Profile Service, depending on the service key transmitted as part of the URL. The SOAP Binding Service might also authenticate the client identity. For more information, see SOAPReceiver Servlet.

3. The Liberty Personal Profile Service implements the DSTRequestHandler to process the request.

   The request is processed based on the type (query or modify) and the query expression. Processing might entail the authorization of a WSC using the OpenSSO Enterprise Policy Service, or it might entail using the Interaction Service for interacting with the user before sending data to the WSC.

4. The Liberty Personal Profile Service builds a service response, adds credentials (if they are required), and sends the response back to the WSC.

   • For a response to a query request, the Liberty Personal Profile Service builds a personal profile container (as defined by the specification). It is formatted in XML and based on the Query Select expression. The Liberty Personal Profile Service attribute values are extracted from the data store by making use of the attribute mapper. The attribute mapper is defined by the XML service file, and the attribute values will be used while building the XML container. The Liberty Personal Profile Service then applies xpath queries on the XML and provides us with the resultant XML data node.

   • For a response to a modify request, the Liberty Personal Profile Service parses the Modifiable Select expression and updates the new data from the new data node in the request.

For initial access, the hosting provider of the Liberty Personal Profile Service needs to be registered with the Discovery Service on behalf of each identity principal. To register a service with the Discovery Service, update the resource offering for that service. For more information, see the Sun OpenSSO Enterprise 8.0 Administration Guide.