Written by
Oana Elena Florea
, Customer Support Manager
- What is Microsoft 365?
- What is Azure Active Directory?
- How can you connect XWiki to Microsoft 365 or Azure AD?
- What are the key benefits of using the Azure AD Application?
What is Microsoft 365?
Microsoft 365 is a productivity business package that brings together the best productivity apps from the Microsoft ecosystem:
Microsoft 365 is the productivity cloud designed to help you pursue your passion and run your business. More than just apps like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Microsoft 365 brings together best-in-class productivity apps with powerful cloud services, device management, and advanced security in one, connected experience.
The XWiki team has created the Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) Application to allow users to easily connect their existing Microsoft 365 accounts or Azure AD accounts to the XWiki platform.
On the technical side, this XWiki extension can be used for both types of accounts because they are based on Azure AD as a identity provider, as mentioned on the Microsoft documentation:
Microsoft 365 uses Azure Active Directory (Azure AD), a cloud-based user identity and authentication service that is included with your Microsoft 365 subscription, to manage identities and authentication for Microsoft 365.
What is Azure Active Directory?
Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) is a cloud-based identity and access management service. This service helps your employees access external resources, such as Microsoft 365, the Azure portal, and thousands of other SaaS applications.
For more details concerning Azure AD, you can take a look at the official Microsoft documentation.
How can you connect XWiki to Microsoft 365 or Azure AD?
The installation can easily be done in two steps:
1. Register and configure the application on the Azure portal
The Azure administrator starts the installation by registering the application on the Azure cloud, adding the necessary permissions as well the URL of the wiki. See the step by step documentation on the XWiki store.
2. Configure the connection on the XWiki side
To complete the connection on the XWiki side, the wiki administrator needs to fill in the information concerning the communication with the Azure AD services: client ID, secret key, tenant ID and return URL. The “Permissions to request” options allow the wiki administrator to specify which information will be copied from the Azure Account to the XWiki profile upon login.
How does it work for simple users?
If the user logins first on Microsoft 365 in their browser, then they will connect with their account there.
When the user will reach the wiki in the same browser, they will have a new screen including the option to “Login with Azure Active Directory”. Accessing this login option should get the user automatically logged in with their Microsoft profile (without having to type any credentials).
If this is the first time they access the wiki, they will see the permissions window that they need to confirm.
What are the key benefits of using the Azure AD Application?
- Reuse the information from an existing Azure AD service.
- SSO login with Microsoft 365 authentication.
- Provides a visual editor inside the wiki Administration section to ease configuration.
- Instant access to new features and bug fixes upon update.
- Technical Support for any question or issue you might encounter when using the application.
