Available for download free of charge

Jun 4, 2010 09:38 GMT  ·  By

A new resource from Microsoft is designed to bridge two of the company’s products. According to the Redmond company, the Microsoft Forefront Integration Kit for Network Access Protection will make Forefront Client Security and Network Access Protection (NAP) play nice together. There are two .ZIP packages available for free through the Microsoft Download Center: the Forefront-NAP Integration Kit and the Informational Materials. Obviously, as a Solution Accelerator, the Microsoft Forefront Integration Kit for Network Access Protection is designed for IT professionals that manage the two Microsoft technologies in their environments.

“This Solution Accelerator is a collection of software components and guidance that you can use to configure a compliance health policy for computers that run Forefront Client Security. Network administrators can use this Accelerator to assess the health of these computers before they are granted network access. If a computer is not compliant with the health policy for Forefront Client Security, it can be isolated to a restricted network until it is properly remediated. These capabilities are enabled by the new NAP feature in Windows Server 2008,” Microsoft stated.

With the Informational materials, Microsoft is simply offering additional resources on top of the kit. The hope is that IT pros will be able to leverage the extra guidance and SHA/SHV components for NAP in their organization. As far as the Forefront-NAP Integration Kit is concerned, the package brings to the table a custom Forefront Client Security SHA and SHV for NAP. Microsoft revealed that customers would also be able to find the deployment guidance packaged in the archive.

The Forefront-NAP Integration Kit also offers: “SHA and SHV components for 32-bit and 64-bit platforms. These NAP components provide the ability to configure a Forefront Client Security compliance health policy, monitor the operational health of Forefront Client Security in real time, and remediate problems that arise. Microsoft Forefront Client Security SHA/SHV Deployment Guide. This document includes an overview of the Kit and information about NAP and Forefront Client Security prerequisites, explains how to install and configure the SHA and SHV, describes remediation actions that the SHA can execute, and provides troubleshooting information,” according to the Redmond company. Microsoft Forefront Integration Kit for Network Access Protection is available for download here.