Now that SCIM 1.0 is final and SCIM 2.0 is starting I wanted to share my thoughts. First here is what I like about SCIM:
- SCIM defined a standard schema in 1.0. I wish SPML had done the same. Not doing so was one of the biggest mistakes we made.
- SCIM supports filtered and paged searches. That’s a must have in my book.
- SCIM supports multi-value attributes with the proper modification semantics. You be surprised how many Identity APIs I have seen that don’t get the modification semantics right.
- SCIM only did what it needed to do, nothing more.
So what don’t I like about SCIM? I don’t really care about the REST vs SOAP aspect. It’s not going to be widely used unless it’s wrapped in an API or toolset. So that’s a moot point. So I can’t really think of anything I don’t like.
But will SCIM be accepted where SPML was not? I don’t know, but I think there is a decent chance. I think announcing the IETF SCIM 2.0 effort so soon may be mistake as it may convince people to just ignore it until 2.0 comes out.
But ultimately the proof of standards is in adoption. For it to succeed it has to be both adopted by the cloud providers as a service and by IT as a client. Each of them wants the other to go first.
My biggest question is will the backers of SCIM implement it in their main product lines. Will SalesForce.com stand up a SCIM provisioning service? Will PingIdentity then add SCIM support to their SalesForce.com offering? We shall see.
Jackson Shaw has some great points to make about it here, but I didn’t really get the parrot reference. He points to this article about SCIM which also makes some great points.
