FIM Certificate Management (FIM CM)
Certificate Management is the outcast member of the FIM family. FIM CM can be, and often is, used by itself, without any other parts of FIM being present. It is also the component with the poorest integration with the other components.
If you look at it, you will find that it hasn't changed much since its predecessor, Certificate Lifecycle Management (CLM), was released.
FIM CM is mainly focused on managing smart cards, but it can also be used to manage and trace any type of certificate requests.
The basic concept of FIM CM is that a smart card is requested using the FIM CM portal. Information regarding all requests is stored in the FIM CM database.
The Certification authority, which handles the issuing of the certificates, is configured to report the status back to the FIM CM database.
FIM CM portal also contains a workflow engine, so that the FIM CM admin can configure features such as e-mail notifications as a part of the policies.
Certificate Management portal
FIM Certificate Management uses a portal to interact with users and administrators. The FIM CM portal is an ASP.Net 2.0 website where, for example:
- Administrators can configure the policies that govern the processes around certificate management
- End users can manage their smart cards for purposes such as renewing and changing PIN codes
- Help desks can use the portal to, for example, request temporary smart cards or reset PINs:
