MidScale Survey

Last modified 15 Nov 2021 16:18 +01:00

MidScale project has an ambition to bring major changes to midPoint. We wanted to make sure that the changes are well aligned with the needs of midPoint community. Therefore we have conducted a survey about our plans in MidScale project. This was an opportunity for midPoint community to express the opinions and thoughts, and influence the future of midPoint.

Although we received less responses that we have expected, the survey provided important insights. We have received 34 complete survey results. We greatly appreciate the effort of the people that took the time to fill out the survey. That time is well spent, as your opinions will influence the future of midPoint.

Overall, the survey results seem to match with our existing plans. However, there are few surprises. Let's review the questions one by one.

Scalability, Performance and the Databases

The goal of midScale project is to increase the total number of identities that midPoint instance can handle. We hope to be able to routinely support deployments with tens of millions of identities. How do you feel about this plan?
5
Excellent! This is exactly what we have been waiting for.
13
Good. We are not at that scale yet, but we may eventually get there.
13
OK. We are pretty happy with midPoint as it is. But we appreciate the effort to make midPoint better, especially if midPoint will work a bit faster for us.
0
Such a waste! MidPoint scalability and performance is good as it is now. You should focus your effort to other areas.
3
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

Looks like midScale is addressing the needs of the community, even though these are future needs rather than current needs. Which is good, as it will take some time for us to finish midScale.

Scalability and performance benefits of midScale will be available only for deployments that run on PostgreSQL database. The reason is that we need to use database-specific features and "tune" the implementation for a specific database engine. PostgreSQL will become primary midPoint database engine, strongly recommended for all midPoint deployments. How do you feel about this?
14
Great news! No problem here, we are running on PostgreSQL already.
9
Good. We are running a different database now, but this is worth migrating to PostgreSQL.
2
Whatever. If you say PostgreSQL, it will be PostgreSQL. Any database will do.
7
Not good. We use a different database and we like it. But if you say we have to migrate then we will do it, eventually. But we will complain all the time!
0
Disaster! This is not going to work. We will never migrate to PostgreSQL, we will rather drop midPoint.
0
I do not know, I have to discuss this with my colleagues.
2
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

We have expected that midPoint community is favorable towards PostgreSQL. However, 74% of answers indicating to be OK with PostgreSQL is even higher than we expected. This seem to validate our plan for PostgreSQL-based high-performance repository implementation.

MidPoint has support for other databases (MS SQL, Oracle, ...) and some of these databases will be supported in the future. However, the code that supports these databases is database-agnostic, not optimized for any specific database engine. Therefore the scalability will be limited, and the performance is likely to be worse than the performance of PostgreSQL implementation. E.g. it is likely that such midPoint deployment may be able to handle maximum of 100,000 identities and peak loads will be limited to just a couple of requests/changes per second. Would you still use it?
2
Yes, by all means. We will keep our current database. We would prefer slow Oracle/MSSQL to a quick PostgreSQL any day.
8
Not sure about this. We would like to use our current database, but we will also consider migrating to PostgreSQL.
2
I would ask you to reconsider this decision. We really need high-performance midPoint implementation that runs on Oracle/MSSQL. There is no way around it.
6
We will migrate to PostgreSQL.
13
No problem here, we are running on PostgreSQL already.
0
I do not know, I'm not the right person to decide this.
3
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

The purpose of this question was to determine, whether it is worth to maintain the traditional generic repository implementation. This is hard to call. There are 4 votes to keep the "old" repository against 19 votes that do not need it any longer. Yet, there are also 8 undecided votes. Which makes this indecisive. We do not want to abandon significant part of midPoint community, despite the majority of votes in favor of new repository. It is quite clear that we cannot drop the "old" repository immediately. And it was never the plan. We will maintain both implementations in parallel, at least for some time. This question cannot be clearly decided now, but we hope to get more insight in the future.

What database engine are you using now, or what database engine would you like to use with future midPoint deployments?
16
PostgreSQL
7
Oracle
5
Microsoft SQL Server
2
MySQL
2
MariaDB
0
I do not know.
2
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

PostgreSQL is a clear winner here. Again. Which is not really surprising, especially given the fact that it was a recommended database for midPoint deployment for a couple of years. The surprising fact is how dominant it is in midPoint community. It has more than twice the votes as its closes competitor. It it four times as popular as MySQL and MariaDB combined.

MidPoint support for MySQL and MariaDB was deprecated in midPoint 4.1. MySQL/MariaDB are still supported, but the support will be removed eventually. How do you feel about this decision?
26
No problem, we are not using MySQL/MariaDB anyway.
2
We are using MySQL/MariaDB, but we can migrate to PostgreSQL without any problems.
3
MySQL/MariaDB support will be missed, but we'll cope. We can migrate to PostgreSQL eventually.
0
This is a disaster. We won't be able to run midPoint without MySQL/MariaDB support.
1
Finally! MySQL/MariaDB are not worth supporting, you should not waste your time on them.
1
I do not know. We might be using MySQL/MariaDB, I'm just not the right person to answer this.
1
Other
No answer
Not displayed

We have deprecated MySQL and MariaDB support a couple of years ago. This question was supposed to give us some guideline regarding the timeline of removing the support. The answers could hardly by any clearer. Almost all of the answers indicated that removing MySQL/MariaDB is not going to be a big problem, nobody indicating it as a showstopper. The next logical step would be to drop MySQL/MariaDB support soon.

We are contemplating our database support strategy for the future. We wonder whether there is significant mass to support Oracle/MSSQL or any other database. How would you feel if PostgreSQL becomes the only supported database in 5-8 year time frame?
16
I'm happy with PostgreSQL, thank you very much.
10
I would like to see my database (Oracle/MSQL/other) supported, but we can use PostgreSQL if it is not.
4
I really need the support for my database in the future. It will be huge problem to migrate to PostgreSQL.
2
I do not really care as long as the database comes with midPoint. E.g. if midPoint comes in a form of a stand-alone image (e.g. docker compose), then I will use whatever database there is, as long as I do not have to manage it directly.
0
This is a show-stopper. I will have to drop midPoint if my database is not supported any more.
1
I do not know, we do not see that far into the future.
1
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

This is slightly less clear than the previous question. Majority of responses are OK with PostgreSQL-only midPoint. Yet, 10 people would like to stay with their current database, there are still 4 responses that are not in favor at all. Although nobody indicated this as a show-stopper, this is still something for us to consider.

Auditing

MidPoint is auditing all the changes in identities, configuration, everything. Does that work for you?
9
We need more! We also need to audit access to data (read). We need to record every operation.
16
This is just right. It works for us well.
0
Less details, please. We need to audit all the operations as they are audited now, we just do not need all the details. E.g. we do not need to see what attributes were changed.
0
Less records, please. We need detailed audit records, but we want to audit just some sensitive operations.
0
Less of everything. Audit log is too detailed in all aspects. We need something much simpler.
4
I need more of this and less of that. Please create some configuration for me to tune auditing details.
1
I need to completely customize the auditing, please let me create my own auditing plug-in. I can do the coding.
0
I do not care, I have no use for audit data.
2
Other
2
No answer
0
Not displayed

Designing auditing subsystem may seem like a simple job, but it is not. There are many choices to make, considering performance, storage capacity, maintainability, evolution of data formats and various other concerns. Yet, it looks like we have done quite a good job designing our auditing facility, as it looks just right for roughly half of the respondents. Significant part of the responses indicate a need for finer auditing, which is something we have to consider in the future. There were voices asking for more configurability in auditing, which we will definitely listen to. At least one thing is clear: nobody wants less data in their audit trails.

How do you plan to use audit records?
22
I want to leave them in midPoint database, access them using midPoint user interface.
14
I can SQL! I want to access audit records directly in the database table, using database or data analytic tools.
18
I have SIEM, I want to pump audit records to my SIEM system.
12
I want to pump the data to a data warehouse for a long-term archival.
10
I want to use the data in a visualization tool. I want to see the charts!
3
I need that data for forensic analysis and I have my own tool to do it.
0
I need that data for forensic analysis and I expect midPoint to it. I have money to pay for this.
1
Other

When we originally designed the audit subsystem, we have expected that the data will not stay in midPoint database for long. We have expected that they will be pumped to other systems such as warehouses, SIEMs and so on. But it looked like this is not happening. We have seem people keeping the data in midPoint database, which was never designed to be keep long-term historical data.

The answers to this question provides a very important insight for us. As we have suspected, most people would like to keep audit data in midPoint database. Which means that we will need to take long-term data storage into our considerations. However, the number of responses indicating integration with SIEM, data warehouses and even forensic tools is surprisingly high, considering relatively low interest about such topics in the past. This is certainly something we will need to consider in our plans.

How long do you want to store audit data in midPoint database?
5
More than 3 years. I have massive database that can handle that.
9
1-3 years. I have big database prepared for that.
13
Up to 1 year. That seems to be reasonable compromise.
1
Just 1-3 months. I will be quickly pumping/archiving/deleting the data.
0
I would like to store the data for a long time, but I do not have terabytes of database space. Can you do some magic to make this possible? I have money to pay for the solution.
4
I do not know yet.
2
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

Answers to this question confirm our suspicion. You would like to store audit data in midPoint database for longer that we have originally expected. Most people want to to store the data for a year or just few years, however there was at least one answer indicating as long as 10 years of data retention. This is yet another indication that we need to improve mid-term to long-term storage of midPoint audit data. Luckily, nobody expects us to do any black magic here. We really appreciate that midPoint has such a pragmatic community.

Platforms

MidPoint has been supported on both UNIX/Linux and Windows platform. However, we are wondering how many Windows deployments are there. How do you feel about Windows support?
3
I need production support for Windows Server. There is no other way.
2
We are running on Windows, but there is no problem to migrate production environment to Linux if needed.
3
We need Windows support only for development, demo, prototyping and similar purposes. We do not need production support.
25
We do not need Windows support at all.
1
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

It does not look very favorable for Windows, does it? Only 3 votes for Windows, against 28 votes that do not mind dropping Windows support. This does not look well for the future of Windows platform support. Of course, midPoint will still be running on Windows. Even some of our own developers use Windows on their machines (although they are a minority). However, we will consider the future of production-level support for Windows.

One of the respondents asked why we would even consider dropping Windows support. The answer is simple: to reduce support overhead. If we include Windows platform in our support, we also have to test midPoint on Windows platform, create and maintain start/stop scripts, consider Windows platform in midPoint documentation and so on. Most of these are small tasks that are done quickly. But there are many of them, we need to keep them in mind, they are a distraction. And then there are exotic issues, such as bugs related to filesystem paths (/ versus \ and C:), obscure platform-dependent Java virtual machine crashes, clustering-related issues and so on. Some of them may be tricky to resolve, it may need a lot of time. This is increasing cost of midPoint support for everybody. We are professionals, and we are more than willing to do all these things as long as there is sufficient demand to justify the costs. Yet, the answers from the survey seems to suggest that the demand for Windows platform support is very low. It looks we have to make decision here.

MidPoint runs on Java platform. Java platform has changed its support model a couple of years ago. There is an long-term support (LTS) version of Java platform released every three years. Latest Java LTS release is Java 11, released in 2018. The next LTS release will be Java 17, planned for September 2021. We usually want to run midPoint on the latest Java LTS version. How do you feel about it?
6
I want the latest and the greatest! Please support new Java versions as soon as you can. I can upgrade my Java platform any time to any version.
4
I can upgrade to Java 17 very quickly after the release (e.g. 1 month). I will be happy to run on Java 17 as soon as possible.
6
I would like to run on Java 17, but we need a bit more time. I need approx. 6 months to adapt.
6
I would like to run on Java 17, but we need quite some time. I need up to a year to adapt.
1
Whoa, not so fast! We have barely upgraded to Java 11. It will take a year or two until we can switch again.
8
Whatever you say. If you say I need Java 17, I will be running Java 17.
0
Please, stay with Java 11 for as long as you can (forever). We are scared of Java platform upgrades.
0
I do not know. I'm not the right person to talk about this.
3
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

It looks like midPoint community is very progressive when it comes to new Java versions. Almost all of you can migrate to new Java version up to a year after it is released. This gives us hope for quick migration to Java 17. This is also an indication for us that we can move ahead to new Java versions quickly after their release. This is a very pleasant surprise, as Java platform upgrades used to be a problem in the past. Let us take these answer as an indication that this problem is gone now.

How would you like to deploy midPoint?
5
Public cloud, such as Amazon AWS.
10
Private cloud, our organization is running the hardware.
13
Docker environment, or similar container technology.
3
Right on the metal! We are traditionalists.
0
I do not really know. They just gave me the access and I have deployed it.
0
I do not know. I'm not the right person to answer this.
3
Other
No answer
Not displayed

Looks like Docker is really popular these days. We like Docker too, and we plan to move in that direction. The use of public/private cloud is really interesting. These are important data for our planning.

How dynamic do you want your midPoint deployment to be?
9
I want midPoint to be fully cloud-native. I want to use cloud database, adding and removing nodes as needed (autoscaling) and all the other cloudy goodies.
7
I want midPoint to feel quite comfortable in the cloud. I want dynamic autoscaling for midPoint nodes, but I'm happy with static database instance.
6
Traditional clustering for me, please. I want a handful of midPoint nodes, storing data in a centralized database engine.
6
I like it simple. Single machine, one midPoint, simple database - that is all I need.
5
Whatever. As long as you provide reasonable performance and high-availability (HA), I do not care how you do it.
0
I do not know, I'm not the right person to answer this.
1
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

The community seems to be divided to two almost equal groups here. We have 16 votes for cloud, 12 votes for more traditional approaches. It looks like we will need to support both. MidPoint has a good foundation in the traditional approach, and we plan to support these for any foreseeable future. However, it looks like we will have to invest more in the "cloudy" improvements in the future, to satisfy the desire for dynamic environments.

We are thinking about new midPoint deployment model, packaging all the necessary components in one bundle. MidPoint, database, web server all bits and pieces neatly packaged together. We are thinking about using Docker compose or a similar technology. What do you think?
1
I love it! I want to have midPoint running in seconds. I do not care what is inside, as long as it works.
14
I quite like it. However, I would like to have some control over it. I want to adjust some deployment and configuration parameters.
9
Not sure. I like the overall idea, but I want to have some choice and control over the components. E.g. I want to select the database engine.
4
Not for me, thank you very much. I want to be in control. I want to deploy everything myself.
1
I like the idea, but could you use something else than Docker?
0
I do not know, I'm not the right person to answer this.
4
Other
1
No answer
0
Not displayed

Obviously, this question was about Docker, stand-alone Spring Boot application, and similar approaches. It looks like the community has a favorable opinion, as long as a reasonable amount of control over the environment is maintained. We understand, that the flexibility of midPoint is a very important aspect, and that reasonable amount of control over midPoint deployment will always be necessary. On the other hand, we also see value in simplification, and unification of the deployments. Only a small portion of community seems to keep everything under their control. This is a very important input for our decision making.

How much availability do you need?
2
I need very high availability, at least 99.999%. I need redundancy in every component, access, compute nodes, database, everything. My deployment needs to survive even a mid-size thermonuclear exchange.
14
I need high availability, somewhere around 99.99%, 99.9% at the worst. I need redundancy in critical components, especially compute nodes and database. The database may be active-passive or hot/cold standby, it may take some time to recover, but the recovery has to be automatic.
10
I need somewhat high availability, 99.9% or even slightly less than that. We need redundant compute nodes, but we can live with non-redundant database. We can recover the database using platform tools (such as virtual machine snapshots) if needed.
6
I need just a bit of availability, around 99%. I can do that with virtual machine images and similar tools. I do not need any special features in midPoint.
2
I do not need anything special. I prefer simple deployments. One midPoint node and one database is all I need. Thank you very much.
0
I do not know, this has not been decided yet.
0
I have no idea what all those numbers and words mean, I'm not that kind of an engineer.
0
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

It looks like majority will be fine somewhere around three nines (99.9%) availability, or slightly more than that. The opinion seems to be leaning towards fully-automatic recovery, which is perfectly understandable.

Evolveum Services

How do you like midPoint?
2
MidPoint is the best product ever. I'm really impressed!
20
MidPoint is great. There is a thing or two that we would like to see improved, but midPoint works well for us.
11
MidPoint is good, above average. Yet, it will certainly benefit from some improvements.
0
MidPoint is an average software. Neither better nor worse than other products in this category.
0
MidPoint is not very good. It has some potential, but you need to work much harder to make it happen.
0
MidPoint is not good at all. It won't work us.
1
I would like to keep my opinion to myself.
0
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

Thank you so much! You seem to like midPoint, which makes us very happy indeed. We consider ourself lucky to cooperate with such an amazing community. We will do our best to keep up the good work.

How do you like Evolveum services? (Services such as support, subscription, trainings, consulting and so on.)
4
You are great, best services ever. Keep up doing good work!
9
Good services, they are worth every cent.
3
Average services, well on industry standard.
1
We are not happy. We will give you one more chance, but you need to work much harder.
0
Worst services ever. I want my money back!
6
We are not using your services yet. But we may use them in the future.
1
We would really like to use your services, but we cannot afford them.
1
Your services do not match our needs. We need something different.
0
I do not need your services, I can do it myself.
2
I do not know. I'm not the right person to answer this.
1
I would like to keep my opinion to myself.
3
Other
3
No answer
0
Not displayed

Thank you for trusting us and purchasing our services! We are happy you understand the importance of having active support and its value proposition. Thanks to your purchases, we receive budget to dedicate development team to maintain and develop midPoint, and help you with your product issues.

Since midPoint 4.0, we have changed midPoint support lifetime policy. Now we have long-term support (LTS) releases with a three-year support lifetime and feature releases with one-year support lifetime. How do you like this approach?
21
I like it. It is just right. It works for us well.
5
I want longer support. I would like the releases to be supported for longer time, even if there is only one release each year.
0
I want longer support, and I have money to pay. I can pay premium to extend the support interval.
1
I want longer support, but I'm not going to pay a single cent. I'm paying enough already.
1
I want more releases. I would like to see three or four releases each year, even if that means shorter support lifetime.
3
I do not really care. We will adapt to any support lifetime as needed.
0
I do not know. This is all too confusing.
2
Other
1
No answer
0
Not displayed

The LTS program seems to work fine overall. There seems to be some sentiment towards longer support. Which may be something to consider. However, longer support lifetime has its cost in money, time and developer capacity. These are very sensitive decisions to make. Fortunately, thank to you, now we have the data to base our decisions on.

What releases do you usually use in production, or what releases are you planning to use?
10
LTS releases (e.g. midPoint 4.0 LTS, planning to upgrade to midPoint 4.4 LTS)
9
Feature releases (e.g. midPoint 4.1, midPoint 4.2, planing to upgrade to midPoint 4.3)
13
Mix of LTS and feature releases, as needed.
0
Living on the edge, we are running on development master branch!
1
We do not know yet.
1
Other
0
No answer
0
Not displayed

It looks like both LTS and feature releases are used in approximately equal proportions. We take it as a sign that the LTS/feature support model works well, both kinds of releases have their place and purpose.

Are you active midPoint subscriber?
17
We have active subscription.
5
We do not have subscription yet, but we plan to acquire subscription soon.
4
We are just evaluating midPoint, nothing is decided yet.
1
We are not midPoint subscriber and we do not plan to purchase subscription.
0
I do not know, I'm not the right person to answer this.
1
No comment. I cannot disclose this information.
3
Other
3
No answer
0
Not displayed

The results show half of you are active subscribers of our services and some are planning to acquire subscription soon or are in the process of evaluating midPoint. Thank you for participating this way on midPoint’s present state-of-the-art status. We would be happy for newcomers who would help us to enhance midPoint’s future. We really appreciate it.

If you catch a golden fish that grants wishes, what would you wish us to do? You could have one wish, you could wish for improvement in midPoint, new feature, change in Evolveum services or policies, what would that wish be?

Reviewing answers to this question was like walking a Garden of Eden. There were far-reaching wishes, such as AI. However, most wishes were very pragmatic and practical.

System stability, especially in multi-threaded operations was mentioned several times. As was the DB schema and performance. Which is a good match, as that is in the scope of midScale project already.

Improvement in documentation was mentioned many times. We are aware of this problem, and we are working on a solution. Your wishes are certainly helpful, they will give us data to correctly prioritize documentation work. However, midPoint is also quite big and comprehensive system. It is easy to document small and simple systems, but documentation of a comprehensive and very flexible system such as midPoint is quite a challenge.

Wishes for simplifications and user experience improvements were also mentioned several times. We are certainly considering these, and we know that there are some important improvements that we have to make in this area. Unfortunately, there is only a finite amount of work that can fit into any particular release.

There were also other wishes and suggestions. All the suggestions are important to us, and we will consider each one of them. This is important information that will help us decided on midPoint roadmap.

Tell Us About Yourself

How would you characterize yourself?
28
Participating in midPoint community (e.g. member of midPoint mailing list)
10
Member of Internet2/InCommon community
3
Affiliated with European academia (education and research)
6
Working for Evolveum partner
14
My organization is Evolveum customer
25
I'm Identity and Access Management (IAM) specialist
1
I'm independent consultant or freelancer
1
Other

We see our survey got into the right hands. Nearly all of you are members of our valuable community and many are IAM specialists. We are happy about a considerable amount of Internet2/InCommon people sharing their ideas and this way influencing the future of midPoint.

What describes your organization the best?
16
Academia, higher education and research
4
Small or medium enterprise (SME)
5
Large corporation
0
Non-profit organization
5
Evolveum partner
2
I do not want to say.
0
Other
2
No answer
0
Not displayed

We are happy that people from academia, higher education and research found time to participate in this survey. Based on this information we are able to make decisions how to be helpful for your vertical even more. We believe we have been improving midPoint in important way for organizations outside this vertical as well and we would get more feedback from them in the future survey. In addition, we see interest in midPoint by large organizations. Based on that, we find our decision to focus on midScale within 4.3 and 4.4 releases to be the right choice. Once midScale is finalised and the community including large organizations would see outcomes of our hard work, we believe there will be survey feedback from them as well to help us with making right decisions.

Conclusion

There was praise of midPoint and Evolveum team in the comments, and we are very thankful about these. The work is easier when we know that it helps other people to do their jobs.

There were many suggestions and remarks. We appreciate all of them. These are important data to make decisions about midPoint future. We would like to thank all of you that participated in the survey and helped to shape the future of midPoint.

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