The mailing list for users of the eduroam Configuration Assistant Tool (CAT)

[Stefan Winter <stefan.winter AT restena.lu>]

Hello,

(and apologies for cross-posting)

it's been a while since we've released the latest update to eduroam CAT.
Back then it was version alpha3S.

Quite a lot has happened since, and we believe we are feature-complete
and self-confident enough to call the new release beta1.

**drum roll** eduroam CAT 1.0-beta1 is here!

The number of changes between alpha3S and beta1 is quite large:

- number of UI languages increased from 9 to 14 ( Català Deutsch
Ελληνικά English(GB) Español Français Hrvatski Italiano Nederlands
Polski Slovenščina Srpski Suomi Svenska )
- support for many popular Linux distributions
- support for Windows 8
- support for EAP-pwd (on some devices)
- use of any authentication source; cat-test.eduroam org will make use
of the common authentication source for all eduroam support services
("eduroam SP proxy")
- better visual feedback when sending invitation mails
- profiles can be hidden from end users until "production-ready"
- custom anonymous outer identities can be specified
- counters for total number of end-user downloads
- Integration with eduroam DB's user privilege system (those of you who
registered as federation admin as per Miro's mail last week are
automatically recognised as being federation admin by CAT)
- integration with eduroam DB's institution data store (if you haven't
populated institution.xml yet - now is the time!)
- Windows installers check for presence and state of a WiFi adapter, and
not try to reinstall CA certificates if they can already be found in the
system
- initial user location is now based on GeoIP hence providing more
accurate results for the GUI

(and yes, we did exchange the code signature certificate from Nicolaus
Copernicus University in Torun to a more sensible TERENA / eduroam.org one)

And that's just the more visible changes; a lot more has been happening
under the hood.

Many of those features were actively requested by users of the alpha
versions; I'm very happy that we have such a responsive user community.
For statistics-aficionados: alpha3S on cat-test.eduroam.org has gotten
141 registered IdPs with 137 configured profiles in total while it was
online.

The only unfortunate news regarding the release is that we had to flush
the database; too many details in the underlying user management and
authorisation management led to too much missing meta-info about
federations, institutions, and profiles. So if you were a happy alpha3S
user, please stay on board and continue after re-registering for beta1.

Regarding the registration of new IdPs, the most striking difference
that the federation operator privilege management system brought in is
that IdPs can no longer self-register for eduroam CAT. Federation
operators can log into the system to "Manage your federation". A quick
and easy dropdown menu lets them choose which of their institutions
known to eduroam DB should get an invitation, and which mail address the
invitation should be sent to. They can also register totally new
institutions *not* present in the eduroam database of course.

So, if you are an IdP and want access to eduroam CAT "please ask your
eduroam federation administrator" :-)

If you are interested in the source code - you will soon find it on
http://downloads.geant.net in the "Roaming" -> "eduroam CAT" directory
(pending upload by DANTE staff).

You can access the system as usual on

http://cat-test.eduroam.org

We have also requested a server certificate, so *in a few days* you'll
also be able to use

https://cat-test.eduroam.org

(which will avoid a nasty popup during the authentication phase)

Greetings,

Stefan Winter

-- 
Stefan WINTER
Ingenieur de Recherche
Fondation RESTENA - Réseau Téléinformatique de l'Education Nationale et
de la Recherche
6, rue Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi
L-1359 Luxembourg

Tel: +352 424409 1
Fax: +352 422473

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