Installing SP2.x under Linux

These instructions apply to installs either using RPMs provided by the Shibboleth Consortium, or using native packages available in Debian/Ubuntu. See NativeSPLinuxInstall in the Shib Wiki for instructions on installing in other versions of Linux, and then adapt these instructions accordingly.

Currently these instructions also assume you are using the prefork version Apache - this may or may not all work with worker. We also assume that your web server serves a single site - virtual hosting issues are addressed elsewhere.

Installation

RPMs

Currently (June 2012) the Shib Consortium provide RPMs for Red Hat Enterprise and CentOS 5, 6 (i386 and x86_64); SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9, 10, 11, 11-SP1 (i386 and x86_64); and OpenSUSE Linux 11.0, 11.1, 11.2, 11.3, 11.4, 12.1 (i386 and x86_64).

Follow the instructions at https://wiki.shibboleth.net/confluence/display/SHIB2/NativeSPLinuxRPMInstall

to install an apropriate set of RPMs.

For SLES10 and zypper it's possible to use Yum repository by adding the appropriate repository with

zypper sa http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/security:/shibboleth/SLE_10/

after which the Shibboleth software can be installed with

zypper in shibboleth

Debian/Ubuntu

Currently (June 2012) Debian includes a package of version 2.3.1 of the SP software in squeeze (stable), and a version of 2.4.3 in squeeze-backports, wheezy (testing) and sid (unstable).

Ubuntu includes a package of version 2.3.1 in lucid (10.04LTS) and natty (11.04), and a package of 2.4.3 in oneiric (11.10), precise (12.04LTS), and quantal (12.10, in development). hardy (8.04LTS) only contained a package of the now unsupported version 1.3.

In all cases, the distribution-supplied version of the SP software can be installed by installing the libapache2-mod-shib2 package and its dependencies, e.g.:

 apt-get install libapache2-mod-shib2

and enabling it:

a2enmod shib2 

Then run shib-keygen to create a key and self-signed X.509 certificate for the Shibboleth SP to use:

 shib-keygen

The key is stored in /etc/shibboleth/sp-key.pem and the certificate in /etc/shibboleth/sp-cert.pem.

Subsequent configuration

After installing the software, in /etc/shibboleth:

• replace the supplied shibboleth2.xml and attribute-map.xml with Shibboleth2.xml - internal use skeleton and Attribute-map.xml - internal use skeleton respectively.
• find all occurrences of 'FIX-ME' in the new shibboleth2.xml and replace them as directed in the adjacent comments (see Editing XML and EntityIDs for useful background).

Run (as root)

 /usr/sbin/shibd -t

and expect to see "overall configuration is loadable, check console for non-fatal problems". Fix any reported mistakes.

Start shibd (as root) with

 /etc/init.d/shibd start

or restart it if it's already running with

 /etc/init.d/shibd restart

[Note: "Starting shibd listener failed to enter listen loop" means that you were not root]. See /var/log/shibboleth/shibd.log for startup messages. The Shibboleth packages will have already set shibd to restart on boot.

(Re-)start Apache. In case of failure see /var/log/apache2/error_log

Before you can proceed any further you will need to register you SP, at least with the 'Ucam federation'. See SP registration for details.

Access http://<hostname>/secure/. You should be redirected to Raven to authenticate, be asked to accept release of your information, and then see a 404 error page from your server (because you have no content in the requested location). See /var/log/apache2/error_log, /var/log/shibboleth/shibd.log and /var/log/shibboleth/transaction.log for clues if something goes wrong. Feel free to create some content in /srv/www/htdocs/secure/ for a better demonstration.

Assuming this works, visit http://<hostname>/Shibboleth.sso/Session to check that attribute information is being released to your SP. You should see a page containing something like:

 Attributes
 ----------
 affiliation: member@cam.ac.uk;member@eresources.lib.cam.ac.uk
 entitlement: urn:mace:dir:entitlement:common-lib-terms
 eppn: fjc55@cam.ac.uk

along with other things.

You now have a web server running the Shibboleth SP software and protecting the content of http://<hostname>/secure/ by requiring an authenticated Raven login (by anyone). Where you go from here depends on what you want to do. Topics to consider include:

• SP registration
• Using SSL and certificates
• Configuring access control
• Using Apache configuration files
• Virtual hosting issues