MidPoint 3.6 “Comenius” is finally released. The Comenius release is huge in all aspects. It is a feature-packed release. It has so many features that Comenius is most likely the richest release in the entire midPoint history. But the number of features is not the only thing that matters. MidPoint 3.6 brings features with a significant effect on almost any identity management and governance deployment.
There are numerous new identity governance features, such as major improvements to approval processes, certifications and segregation of duties (SoD) mechanisms. MidPoint now supports the concept of personas and policy rules got established as a real first-class citizen. Existing internal mechanisms were adjusted to seamlessly support new identity governance concepts. MidPoint is now one of the very rare breed of system that can support state-of-the-art identity management and fair deal of identity governance in the same product. Same mechanisms and tools are used to control both identity management and governance parts of the solution. Identity governance with midPoint is seamless and unified by design. This is our long-term strategy to cut down the enormous cost of ownership that the first-generation identity management and governance systems imposed on their users. MidPoint 3.6 is second-generation identity governance system that can easily go where old and obsolete technologies struggle. Just a year ago midPoint had only a very minimal governance support. Today we have advanced governance features, some of which are quite unique even among the long established brands. Just imagine where midPoint could be next year!
MidPoint 3.6 also brings long-desired features for identity management. MidPoint supports password hashing together with a complete process of mail-based initialization of new accounts. There is no longer need for midPoint to store passwords, not even in the encrypted form. There were improvements to password policies and general password handling in the connectors. Now we have full support for PowerShell execution in the Active Directory connector complete with CredSSP support. We have brand new CSV connector. And there is a big thing under the hood: partial support for asynchronous provisioning that brought us ability to integrate midPoint with ITSM systems. But this specific feature deserves a post on its own.
User interface got a bunch of improvements too. There are improvements to the role catalog and shopping cart – especially to support policies such as SoD. User interface is now more customizable. MidPoint has partial support for custom forms (remember SunIDM?), the data tables are partially customizable and there is an easy way to distinguish testing and production environment by different colors. MidPoint now has fulltext-like capability, quick export of of data to CSV files and there were general user experience improvements.
MidPoint 3.6 is undoubtedly a great leap in a technological sense. But it is also a major milestone in a business sense. Almost all midPoint 3.6 features were sponsored or funded by means of midPoint subscriptions. MidPoint 3.6 is setting a trend. MidPoint development is now strictly customer-driven. All the new features in all the future midPoint releases will need to be sponsored or endorsed by a midPoint subscriber. We are updating development plan for midPoint 3.7 right now and it is already getting quite crowded. Therefore, if you want to influence the future of midPoint, get your subscription now. From now on MidPoint development team will quite strictly focus on the needs of the people that pay our bills.