SAP Cloud Integration – OAuth2 SAML Bearer/X.509 C...

DeepakGDeshpande · ‎2021 Mar 26

Introduction

SAP Cloud Integration version 3.36.**/5.20.**/6.12.** comes with enhancement on SuccessFactors OData V2 outbound connector with OAuth2 SAML Bearer/X.509 Certificate authentication.

Note: The forecasted SAP Cloud Integration customer tenant updates/availability of this version is planned on or after 3rd/10th April 2021 as per the phased tenant update procedures, which may be subjected to change.

OAuth2 SAML Bearer /X.509 Certificate authentication is not new to SuccessFactors OData V2 outbound connector in SAP Cloud Integration, because it has been used in the context of principal propagation as described in the blog https://blogs.sap.com/2018/07/30/sap-cloud-platform-integration-principal-propagation-with-successfa... , but here in this blog, the support of OAuth2 SAML Bearer in the context of a dedicated/technical user has been described to support planned retirement of Basic Authentication in SAP SuccessFactors system as per the plan https://help.sap.com/viewer/62b1a0b4b34c4c36869e21c8db128e49/latest/en-US/a2f874d8f3194cc5adba237d00....

Setup

To consume this new feature, below steps have to be followed.

Step 1: Creating a key pair in SAP Cloud Integration (or you can also upload one if you have)

Step 2: Registering an OAuth2 client in SAP SuccessFactors System

Step 3: Deploying OAuth2 SAML Bearer credentials in SAP Cloud Integration

Step 4: Designing Integration Flow with SuccessFactors OData V2 outbound connector

Step 1: Creating a Key Pair in SAP Cloud Integration

In this example, a new key pair creation is considered, if you have a valid key pair, you can re-use it by uploading the same.

In SAP Cloud Integration Web UI Monitoring section, click on Keystore tile

Keystore UI Tile

Click on the Create -> Key Pair

Create Key Pair

Provide the relevant details. The value for Common Name (CN) should be the user name exists in your SAP SuccessFactors instance who has the access/authority to invoke the SuccessFactors API through OAuth2 token.

Key Pair details. CN value should be of a user at SAP SuccessFactors system

Click on Create button once finished providing details. Copy (or remember) the Alias name for further use. In this example, the alias is "samplekeypair1".

After creation, download the certificate part of it. The public key of this file will be used while registering the OAuth2 client in SAP SuccessFactors system.

Download Certificate

Step 2: Registering an OAuth2 client in SAP SuccessFactors System

Login to your SAP SuccessFactors system as administrator and then create a new OAuth2 Client in ‘Manage OAuth2 Client Applications” section. .

Click on Register Client Application

Open the certificate file you have downloaded in Step 1 in text editor.

Certificate File in text editor

In creating OAuth2 Client Application, provide relevant details, copy the certificate part (the content between -----BEGIN CERTIFICATE----- and -----END CERTIFICATE-----) and add/paste that into X.509 Certificate place. Click on Register, and get hold of API Key (which will be treated as Client Key when deploying OAuth2 SAML Bearer credentials in SAP Cloud Integration)

Click on Register button

Click on View button of your OAuth2 client application

Copy the API Key value, which will be treated as Client Key while deploying OAuth2 SAML Bearer credentials in SAP Cloud Integration

Step 3: Deploying OAuth2 SAML Bearer credentials

In the Monitoring Section of SAP Cloud Integration, click on the 'Security Material' UI tile, and then click on Create -> OAuth2 SAML Bearer Assertion. Provide the relevant details, and select User ID as Key Pair Common Name (CN) and provide the alias of Key Pair created in step 1, in this case, samplekeypair1.

Monitoring Security Material UI tile

Create - OAuth2 SAML Bearer Assertion credentials

While creating the credentials,

Name, allowed name of your choice, 'sampleOAuth2Alias' in this example

Client Key will be the API Key received after registering the OAuth2 client in SAP SuccessFactors system.

Token Service URL is the URL of SAP SuccessFactors OAuth2 token server.

User ID select Key Pair Common Name(CN) in the drop down control.

Select User ID as Key Pair Common Name (CN)

Provide the Key Pair Alias, and click on Deploy

Step 4: Designing Integration Flow

In SAP Cloud Integration, create an integration flow with SuccessFactors OData V2 outbound adapter and select the authentication as OAuth2 SAML Bearer, and provide the credential alias created in step 3, in this example, it is 'sampleOAuth2Alias'

Note: A side remark; the Accept-Encoding GZIP configuration has been provided for the newer SuccessFactors OData V2 connector version 1.18, which is aimed to reduce the time taken between SAP Cloud Integration and SAP SuccessFactors endpoint HTTP communication through zip stream over the network.

Querying User API/Entity as an example under Processing tab

In this Integration Flow example, I am using HTTP sender adapter, which will provide an HTTP endpoint after deployment. After invoking that HTTP endpoint, the integration flow message executes, the OAuth2 token is fetched by the SAP SuccessFactors OData V2 outbound connector and further invokes the SAP SuccessFactors system endpoint to fetch all the User records with OAuth2 SAML Bearer authentication.

The token caching is also handled as well.

Result of invoking HTTP endpiont of Integration Flow in this example

Next Steps

As you might have observed, currently, the SuccessFactors OData V2 outbound connector has got the OAuth2 SAML Bearer assertion for a dedicated/technical user.

As next steps, the same support for

SuccessFactors SOAP outbound connector : Update : The support for OAuth2 SAML Bearer/x.509 authentication has been enabled for SuccessFactors SOAP outbound connector with SAP Cloud Integration version 5.23.**/6.15.**. You can refer the blog post https://blogs.sap.com/2021/07/29/how-to-use-oauth2-saml-bearer-assertion-in-sap-cloud-platform-integ... for more details.

SuccessFactors OData V2 Query Wizard and SuccessFactors SOAP Query Wizard : Update : The support for OAuth2 SAML Bearer/x.509 authentication has been enabled for SuccessFactors OData V2 Query Wizard and SuccessFactors SOAP Query Wizard with SAP Cloud Integration version 5.24.**/6.16.**.

will be provided in next increments, for which the blog shall be updated.

Summary

The support for OAuth2 SAML Bearer assertion/X.509 Certificate authentication has now been enabled for SuccessFactors OData V2 for a dedicated/technical user to support the planned retirement activities of Basic Authentication in SAP SuccessFactors. Now, the OAuth2 SAML Bearer can be used in the context of principal propagation as well as in the context of a dedicated/technical user.