At its annual BrainShare conference, Novell introduced two modular platforms designed to let developers build Web-services applications and make applications identity-enabled.

The concept of identity-driven computing was a major theme of the opening keynote address by Novell's chairman and CEO, Jack Messman. Identity management is more complicated than just people and passwords, Messman said.

"Identity driven computing is expanding to any corporate asset, [piece of] data, and business process," he said.

For example, by treating a PDA as an identity and a person and the information on the device as identities, fine-grained access control can be achieved, according to vice-president of Novell Extend and Nsure, Frank Auger. The two SDKs, Application Services Foundation (ASF) and Identity Services Foundation (ISF), are integrated, modular platforms that give developers a security and application services stack that combines open source and commercial software.

The SDKs provide the entire foundation of identity and security components, allowing customers to pick and choose what components are useful to them, according to Auger.

The ASF is a complementary set of technologies that allows developers to build Web-services-based applications.

"ASF provides the services you need to develop business processes, functions, and workflows from legacy systems, products, and services, and manage those services as identities," Auger said.

The ISF lets developers or partners implement identity-driven behavior in applications.

Future identity-driven product plans include a new version of iChain, due in beta version in September. The product will be renamed Novell Access Manager and will include federated provisioning capabilities and deeper Liberty Alliance spec support.

A solution set designed for regulatory compliance is also on tap. The compliance suite will be built on top of and around Novell's identity product set, including the company's Nsure Audit product, Nsure Identity Manager, and will add software, methodology, and business consulting services for compliance.