Policy Server Guides › Policy Design Guide › Authentication Schemes › HTML Forms Authentication Schemes › HTML Forms Authentication Templates › Collect Additional Attributes

Collect Additional Attributes

In addition to username and password, you can collect additional attributes from users, such as a users email address or job title.

To collect additional attributes

1. Specify the attribute(s) by configuring the HTML Forms authentication scheme and the associated .fcc file.
2. Configure the HTML Forms authentication scheme by specifying new attributes in the Additional Attribute List fields of the Scheme Setup dialog.

   Note: If you expect the additional attributes or the Password to contain special characters (" . & = + ? ; / : @ = , $ %), you need to URL-encode each additional attribute value in the .fcc file. SiteMinder uses US-ASCII encoding.

3. Modify the .fcc file to collect additional attributes.

   To modify the .fcc file, add the following line at the beginning of the file:

   @password=PASSWORD=%PASSWORD%&newattr1=%newattr1%&newattr2=%newattr2%
   

   If the additional attributes have special characters, the line should look like the following:

   @password=PASSWORD=%urlencode(PASSWORD)%&newattr1%=%urlencode(newattr1)%&newattr2=%urlencode(newattr2)%
   

   where newattr1=%newattr1%and newattr2=%newattr2% represent the additional attributes. The value before the equals sign is the attribute name and the value between the percent sign (%) sign is the attribute value.

   The FCC parses the names of the new attributes from the attribute values.

   Note: Append additional attributes to the @password directive with the ampersand (&) character.

When you add attributes to the FCC, keep the following in mind:

• The attribute name, which is identified by the %attribute_name% format, must match the input name entry that you also add to the FCC. For example, if you add the new attribute address:

  @password=PASSWORD=%PASSWORD%&mail=%address%
  

  or

  @password=PASSWORD=%urlencode(PASSWORD)%&mail=%urlencode(address)%
  

  you would add a line to the .fcc file similar to the following:

  <input name=”address” type=”text”>

• The name of the additional attribute must match the name of the attribute in the user directory. For example, to collect email addresses from an LDAP directory, specify one of the following:

  @password=PASSWORD=%PASSWORD%&mail=%address%

  or

  @password=PASSWORD=%urlencode(PASSWORD)%&mail=%urlencode(address)%

  where mail is the name of the LDAP attribute that stores email addresses.

• Do not add additional spaces after the value you specify for the @password directive. Additional spaces may be interpreted as meaningful characters and prevent users from being authenticated.
• The name of the attribute in the HTML Forms Authentication scheme must match the name of the additional attribute in the .fcc file.

  For example, to add the attribute mail (from the example above) to the authentication scheme, enter the following in the Additional Attributes List field:

  AL=PASSWORD,mail

  Note: The additional attribute names are case-sensitive.

More information:

HTML Forms Authentication Schemes