MSSQL User Authentication Mode for AEM 6.5 JEE Servers

[pranaym48551345]

Hi All,

We have a setup were we are installing AEM 6.5 JEE forms on WebSphere and the servers are hosted in Unix Platform. This is a standalone setup and every server has its own instance of MSSQL server. However as per the understanding we created couple of users i.e. "DB_OWNER user" and "Forms user" to associate AEM forms users with database. For the users creation we used the authentication mode as "SQL Server Authentication Mode". Using this setup the installation went through and we can see that the tables were also created in the database.

However the team asked us to create the same SQL users but use "Windows authentication" instead of "SQL Server authentication" for another server and perform the installation.

Can someone please let me know if this is possible with our setup (Application Server: WebSphere and AEM Server hosted on Unix) or we can follow the original steps. Additionally if we go with the new setup with windows authentication do we need to perform any additional steps during installations..??

Thanks

[Pulkit_Jain_ · Accepted solution]

@pranaym48551345 

Taking reference from a few MSDN articles, it is not possible to use native Windows Authentication for JDBC connections to MSSQL from a JVM running on Linux.

There are two main JDBC drivers for SQL Server.

One is from Microsoft and the other from jTDS. jTDS can connect using Windows auth (NTLM) from other platforms, including Linux, as described here: http://jtds.sourceforge.net/faq.html#windowsAuth. It can also use SQL-authenticated logins. 

But, with the case at hand i.e AEM Forms installation, we are supposed to use Microsoft-provided JDBC driver only thus this limitation. 

Hope this helps! 

[Mayank_Gandhi]

Based on some old experience, you should switch the authentication mode after installation and configuration.

If you are using SQL Server integrated security, you can set your SQL Server database to Mixed Mode or Windows Authentication Mode. However, if you are using Windows Authentication Mode, you must configure integrated security on Windows to establish a trusted connection with SQL Server (see Map the Windows login to the AEM forms on JEE database user).

Note: Configuration Manager fails to validate the database connection if you use Windows Authentication Mode. Therefore, for partial turnkey installation, the authentication type must be set to SQL Server. You can turn on the Windows Authentication Mode once Configuration Manager completes validating the database connection.

*However no note for Unix