14 DAY TRIAL // Want a simpler way to test drive Microsoft's next-generation federated identity technologies? Well, the Redmond company does offer customers virtual machines of codename Geneva for evaluation, in an effort to streamline as much as possible the testing process. Accompanying the Geneva Virtual Machines offered on the Microsoft Download Center are resources delivered to help consumers build and set up a test lab environment for the federated identity solutions. In this context, in addition to the VMs, the Geneva Server Federated Collaboration Step by Step Guide is also up for grabs from the software giant.
“The Geneva Server Federated Collaboration Step by Step Guide is intended for information technology (IT) professionals and system architects who want to implement secure collaboration between organizations using Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and "Geneva" Server. This guide provides a quick demonstration of the features, functionality, and interoperability capabilities of “Geneva” Server Beta 2, “Geneva” Framework Beta 2, and Windows CardSpace “Geneva” Beta 2. The instructions in this guide should take approximately 90 minutes or less to complete,” Microsoft informed.
Base, CONTOSOSRV01, CONTOSOSRV02, FABRIKAMSRV01, and FABRIKAMCLT01 are the virtual machine images offered by Microsoft. The company noted that the sheer size of the downloads meant that customers would need to use Internet Explorer 8 in order to get the bits. The components of the Microsoft Code Name "Geneva" SbS Guides and VMs package weigh in at over 14 GB. But test driving Geneva will be no simple task. The Redmond company informed that customers would need either Windows Server 2008 or Windows Server 2008 R2 with the Hyper-V Server Role, and a server with 4 processor cores running no less than 8GB of RAM.
“How to Configure Geneva Server to Provide SSO Access to Microsoft Online Services provides instructions for configuring the next generation of Microsoft federated identity technologies, code named “Geneva,” for access to Microsoft Online Services. This document is intended for information technology (IT) professionals who want to implement an end-to-end, claims-based, Web single-sign-on (SSO) and identity-based federation solution for Microsoft Online Services,” the company added.
Alternatively Geneva Beta 2 ("Geneva" Server, "Geneva" Framework, CardSpace "Geneva") is available for download here.
The Geneva virtual machines can be downloaded via this link.