System and method for provisioning resources to users based on policies, roles, organizational information, and attributes

摘要

A method for provisioning users with resources is disclosed. The method includes the steps of establishing a set of attributes, organizational information, and user roles, and defining a plurality of resource provisioning policies based on selected attributes and user roles. The method also includes the steps of receiving attribute information, organizational information, and user role information for a particular user or resource, determining which resource access policies are applicable to the user based on the received user role information and attribute information, and provisioning the user with resources based on the applicable resource access policies. The resources to be provisioned include “hard” resources as well as “soft” resources. “Soft” resources may include e-mail and voice mail accounts, application programs, databases, files, folders, the Internet, Web pages, organizational Intranets, messages to third parties, digital certificates , the capability to purchase products over the Internet, the ability to order a corporate credit card, access to financial services providers, and the like. In addition, users may be provisioned with “hard” resources such as telephones, computers, cellular telephones, pagers, personal digital assistants, desks, chairs, file cabinets, other physical components, and the like. In addition, a user may be provisioned with resource bundles, which a resources that are comprised of other resources.