WLC integration with LDAP

Question

Hi all and thank you in advance for any you help/advice you might be able to offer....
I'm having problems getting a WLC (7.0.220.0) working using LDAP (Windows 2008). This evening, in an effort to troubleshoot the problem further, I have configured the customer's ASA to use LDAP too and run a test....as you can see below, the test works flawlessly (on the ASA).
aaa-server LDAP_TEST protocol ldap
aaa-server LDAP_TEST host x.x.x.x
server-port 389
ldap-base-dn OU=Users,OU=IT Dept (South),DC=yyy,DC=co,DC=zzz
ldap-scope subtree
ldap-login-password *
ldap-login-dn CN=ldap,OU=Users,OU=IT Dept (South),DC=yyy,DC=co,DC=zzz
server-type microsoft
ASA/act# test aaa-server authentication LDAP_TEST host x.x.x.x username ldap password password
INFO: Attempting Authentication test to IP address <x.x.x.x> (timeout: 12 seconds)
INFO: Authentication Successful
ASA/act#
Now, my understanding is that the ASA only supports PAP (clear text) as Authentication method when communicating to an LDAP server....while on the Controller, I am using EAP-FAST....so my understanding would be that only EAP-FAST/GTC or EAP-FAST/MSCHAPv2 (IF the LDAP server is setup to return a clear text password) are supported.
On the Controller, I am using the very same settings as I have used on the ASA (for the LDAP server configuration). However, users are still unable to Authenticate....they Associate, but do not Authenticate. The clients are all Windows 7 and are setup to use the in-built Cisco EAP-FAST as Authentication method. We are not using certificates.
The thing is that I'm pretty sure that both the Windows 7 clients and the Controller are setup correctly but, as I said, the clients are still unable to authenticate.
I guess that my questions are these:
- on the client side, you can setup the laptops to use "Any method" as authentication method...but how does this exactly work? do they try both EAP-GTC and EAP-MSCHAPv2 (i.e. if it can't authenticate through EAP-GTC will then try EAP-MSCHAPv2?)
- is it better to hardcode the clients to use EAP-GTC or EAP-MSCHAPv2 (instead of default "Any method")....when working on an LDAP environment
- how can I check that the MS 2008 server is indeed setup to "return a clear text password" if using EAP-FAST/MSCHAPv2 (and I do realize that this is probably a question for a Microsoft forum)
- how can I check the the LDAP server is configured to support EAP-GTC and/or EAP-MSCHAPv2??
Thanks again.

Answer 1

This is not an acceptable answer.  Steve, do you work for Cisco, or are you commenting on personal experience & knowledge?
I have had a working RADIUS configuration for 2 years+ of an ASA 5510 for authentication of AnyConnect SSL & IPSEC VPN clients with AD, and a WLC 2106 for authentication of WPA2-Enterprise w/802.1x certificates with AD.  Both were configured to communication to the same RADIUS server that is a Windows Server 2003 DC with IAS/RADIUS and a CA installed.  During the planning for installing a new Windows Server 2008 R2 DC, I decided to attempt to remove my reliance on RADIUS since authenticating directly with LDAP is becoming more common.  I was successfully able to configure our ASA to do direct LDAP queries to AD, but similar to "superduperlopez" and "rschwenderman", I have been unable to configure the WLC the same way.
I feel like the following line in Cisco's documentation is unsatisfactory:  "For example, Microsoft Active Directory is not supported because it does not return a clear-text password."
I would take this to mean that the ASA is working correctly due to either:
A) The ASA is accepting clear-text passwords from AD, and AD is configured to pass clear-text passwords, or
B) The ASA is not accepting clear-text passwords from AD, and AD is not configured to pass clear-text passwords
Now this would lead me to the following:
A) Cisco has not properly updated the WLC documentation to instruct users how to correctly configured the WLC to do backend LDAP queries, or
B) Cisco has not implemented the technology changes that were made in the ASA to the WLC
This frustrates the average network admin, as it is seen by us as "If the ASA can do it, why can't the WLC".  Also, don't get this confused with any "client" issues, as all that is being asked for is the WLC to using a different backend "authentication" server while not modifying the client side at all.  The concept of "Local EAP" seems to fit, but doesn't work.
I would really appreciate someone giving some insight on this topic, as there are three customers on this forum post that have had the same problem withing the last 2 months.
The previous posters, and myself, are not looking for someone to retype the documentation, but rather explain how it is working on one of Cisco's security products, but not the other.