Tutorial: Azure Active Directory integration with SumTotalCentral

In this tutorial, you learn how to integrate SumTotalCentral with Azure Active Directory (Azure AD). Integrating SumTotalCentral with Azure AD provides you with the following benefits:

  • You can control in Azure AD who has access to SumTotalCentral.
  • You can enable your users to be automatically signed-in to SumTotalCentral (Single Sign-On) with their Azure AD accounts.
  • You can manage your accounts in one central location - the Azure portal.

If you want to know more details about SaaS app integration with Azure AD, see What is application access and single sign-on with Azure Active Directory. If you don't have an Azure subscription, create a free account before you begin.

Prerequisites

To configure Azure AD integration with SumTotalCentral, you need the following items:

  • An Azure AD subscription. If you don't have an Azure AD environment, you can get one-month trial here
  • SumTotalCentral single sign-on enabled subscription

Scenario description

In this tutorial, you configure and test Azure AD single sign-on in a test environment.

Note

Identifier of this application is a fixed string value so only one instance can be configured in one tenant.

To configure the integration of SumTotalCentral into Azure AD, you need to add SumTotalCentral from the gallery to your list of managed SaaS apps.

  1. Sign in to the Azure portal using either a work or school account, or a personal Microsoft account.
  2. On the left navigation pane, select the Azure Active Directory service.
  3. Navigate to Enterprise Applications and then select All Applications.
  4. To add new application, select New application.
  5. In the Add from the gallery section, type SumTotalCentral in the search box.
  6. Select SumTotalCentral from results panel and then add the app. Wait a few seconds while the app is added to your tenant.

Configure and test Azure AD SSO

In this section, you configure and test Azure AD single sign-on with SumTotalCentral based on a test user called Britta Simon. For single sign-on to work, a link relationship between an Azure AD user and the related user in SumTotalCentral needs to be established.

To configure and test Azure AD single sign-on with SumTotalCentral, you need to complete the following building blocks:

  1. Configure Azure AD SSO - to enable your users to use this feature.
  2. Configure SumTotalCentral SSO - to configure the Single Sign-On settings on application side.
  3. Test SSO - to verify whether the configuration works.

Configure Azure AD SSO

Follow these steps to enable Azure AD SSO in the Azure portal.

  1. In the Azure portal, on the SumTotalCentral application integration page, find the Manage section and select single sign-on.

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

  3. 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

  4. On the Basic SAML Configuration section, perform the following steps:

    SumTotalCentral Domain and URLs single sign-on information

    a. In the Sign on URL text box, type a URL using the following pattern: https://<subdomain>.sumtotalsystems.com/sites/default

    b. In the Identifier (Entity ID) text box, type the value: SumTotalFederationGateway

    c. In the Reply URL textbox, enter a URL using the following pattern:
    https://<subdomain>.sumtotalsystems.com/Broker/Token/CUSTOM_URL

    Note

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

  5. On the Set up Single Sign-On with SAML page, in the SAML Signing Certificate section, click Download to download the Federation Metadata XML from the given options as per your requirement and save it on your computer.

    The Certificate download link

  6. On the Set up SumTotalCentral section, copy the appropriate URL(s) as per your requirement.

    Copy configuration URLs

    a. Login URL

    b. Azure AD Identifier

    c. Logout URL

Create an Azure AD test user

In this section, you'll create a test user named B.Simon in the Azure portal.

  1. In the left pane of the Azure portal, select Azure Active Directory, select Users, and then select All users.
  2. At the top of the screen, select New user.
  3. In the User properties, follow these steps:
    1. In the Name field, enter B.Simon.
    2. In the User name field, enter <username>@<companydomain>.<extension>. For example: B.Simon@contoso.com.
    3. Select the Show password check box, and then make note of the value that's displayed in the Password box.
    4. Select Create.

Assign the Azure AD test user

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

  1. In the Azure portal, select Enterprise Applications, and then select All applications.

  2. In the applications list, select SumTotalCentral.

  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 SumTotalCentral SSO

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

Create SumTotalCentral test user

In this section, you create a user called Britta Simon in SumTotalCentral. Work with SumTotalCentral support team to add the users in the SumTotalCentral platform. Users must be created and activated before you use single sign-on.

Test SSO

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

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

Additional Resources