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Tutorial: Microsoft Entra single sign-on (SSO) integration with eCornell

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In this tutorial, you'll learn how to integrate eCornell with Microsoft Entra ID. When you integrate eCornell with Microsoft Entra ID, you can:

  • Control in Microsoft Entra ID who has access to eCornell.
  • Enable your users to be automatically signed-in to eCornell with their Microsoft Entra accounts.
  • Manage your accounts in one central location.

To learn more about SaaS app integration with Microsoft Entra ID, see What is application access and single sign-on with Microsoft Entra ID.

Prerequisites

To get started, you need the following items:

  • A Microsoft Entra subscription. If you don't have a subscription, you can get a free account.
  • eCornell single sign-on (SSO) enabled subscription.

Scenario description

In this tutorial, you configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO in a test environment.

  • eCornell supports SP initiated SSO
  • eCornell supports Just In Time user provisioning

To configure the integration of eCornell into Microsoft Entra ID, you need to add eCornell from the gallery to your list of managed SaaS apps.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a Cloud Application Administrator.
  2. Browse to Identity > Applications > Enterprise applications > New application.
  3. In the Add from the gallery section, type eCornell in the search box.
  4. Select eCornell from results panel and then add the app. Wait a few seconds while the app is added to your tenant.

Alternatively, you can also use the Enterprise App Configuration Wizard. In this wizard, you can add an application to your tenant, add users/groups to the app, assign roles, as well as walk through the SSO configuration as well. Learn more about Microsoft 365 wizards.

Configure and test Microsoft Entra single sign-on for eCornell

Configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO with eCornell using a test user called B.Simon. For SSO to work, you need to establish a link relationship between a Microsoft Entra user and the related user in eCornell.

To configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO with eCornell, complete the following building blocks:

  1. Configure Microsoft Entra SSO - to enable your users to use this feature.
  2. Configure eCornell SSO - to configure the single sign-on settings on application side.
    • Create eCornell test user - to have a counterpart of B.Simon in eCornell that is linked to the Microsoft Entra representation of user.
  3. Test SSO - to verify whether the configuration works.

Configure Microsoft Entra SSO

Follow these steps to enable Microsoft Entra SSO.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a Cloud Application Administrator.

  2. Browse to Identity > Applications > Enterprise applications > eCornell > Single sign-on.

  3. On the Select a single sign-on method page, select SAML.

  4. On the Set up single sign-on with SAML page, click the edit/pen icon for Basic SAML Configuration to edit the settings.

    Edit Basic SAML Configuration

  5. On the Basic SAML Configuration section, enter the values for the following fields:

    a. In the Sign-on URL text box, type a URL using the following pattern: https://admin.ecornell.com/sso/clp/<groupCode>

    b. In the Identifier box, type a URL using the following pattern: http://pingone.com/<eCornellCustomGUID>

    c. In the Reply URL text box, type a URL using the following pattern: https://sso.connect.pingidentity.com/sso/sp/ACS.saml2?saasid=<CustomGUID>

    Note

    These values are not real. Update these values with the actual Sign-On URL, Identifier and Reply URL. Contact eCornell Client support team to get these values. You can also refer to the patterns shown in the Basic SAML Configuration section.

  6. eCornell application expects the SAML assertions in a specific format, which requires you to add custom attribute mappings to your SAML token attributes configuration. The following screenshot shows the list of default attributes.

    image

  7. In addition to above, eCornell application expects few more attributes to be passed back in SAML response which are shown below. These attributes are also pre populated but you can review them as per your requirements.

    Name Source Attribute
    firstName user.givenname
    lastName user.surname
    email user.mail
    SAML_SUBJECT user.userprincipalname

  8. On the Set up single sign-on with SAML page, in the SAML Signing Certificate section, find Federation Metadata XML and select Download to download the certificate and save it on your computer.

    The Certificate download link

  9. On the Set up eCornell section, copy the appropriate URL(s) based on your requirement.

    Copy configuration URLs

Create a Microsoft Entra test user

In this section, you'll create a test user called B.Simon.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a User Administrator.
  2. Browse to Identity > Users > All users.
  3. Select New user > Create new user, at the top of the screen.
  4. In the User properties, follow these steps:
    1. In the Display name field, enter B.Simon.
    2. In the User principal name field, enter the [email protected]. For example, [email protected].
    3. Select the Show password check box, and then write down the value that's displayed in the Password box.
    4. Select Review + create.
  5. Select Create.

Assign the Microsoft Entra test user

In this section, you'll enable B.Simon to use single sign-on by granting access to eCornell.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a Cloud Application Administrator.

  2. Browse to Identity > Applications > Enterprise applications > eCornell.

  3. In the app's overview page, find the Manage section and select Users and groups.

    The "Users and groups" link

  4. Select Add user, then select Users and groups in the Add Assignment dialog.

    The Add User link

  5. In the Users and groups dialog, select B.Simon from the Users list, then click the Select button at the bottom of the screen.

  6. If you're expecting any role value in the SAML assertion, in the Select Role dialog, select the appropriate role for the user from the list and then click the Select button at the bottom of the screen.

  7. In the Add Assignment dialog, click the Assign button.

Configure eCornell SSO

To configure single sign-on on eCornell side, you need to send the downloaded Federation Metadata XML and appropriate copied URLs from the application configuration to eCornell support team. They set this setting to have the SAML SSO connection set properly on both sides.

Create eCornell test user

In this section, a user called B.Simon is created in eCornell. eCornell supports just-in-time user provisioning, which is enabled by default. There is no action item for you in this section. If a user doesn't already exist in eCornell, a new one is created after authentication.

Test SSO

In this section, you test your Microsoft Entra single sign-on configuration using the Access Panel.

When you click the eCornell tile in the Access Panel, you should be automatically signed in to the eCornell for which you set up SSO. For more information about the Access Panel, see Introduction to the Access Panel.

Additional resources