Authentication In OBIEE

People often ask question below for authentication in OBIEE

Question : What are the different ways to authenticate an user in OBIEE system? Can OBIEE authenticate a user passing through multiple authentication methods? Which one is the best long term?

OBIEE Support four types of authentication.

1)LDAP Authentication : Users are authenticated based on credentials stored in LDAP.This is the BEST method to do authentication in OBIEE and it supports company’s Single Sign On (SSO) philosophy as well.

2)External Table Authentication : If users belongs to multiple groups ,that information is being pulled from the data base scheme table.This usually implemented with LDAP Authentication

3)Database Authentication: The Oracle BI Server can authenticates user based on database logins. If a user has read permission on a specific database.Oracle BI Presentation Services authenticates those users

4)Oracle BI Server User Authentication: User are directly crated in OBIEE and are authenticated against those credentials. This is the worst authentication method if company has larger then few people using the system. Believe me Maintenance is a nightmare here.

Two authentication methods are usually combined together.like LDAP and external table authentication.

And as i said earlier LDAP and/or LDAP with external table are BEST authentication(Again each case is different)

Oracle BI Server User Authentication is not quite popular as it has its support/maintenance issue associated ,once system grows beyond certain users