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The InCommon Deployment Profile working group was chartered by the InCommon Technical Advisory Group in the fall of 2016. The group was charged with creating a deployment profile that could be layered on top of the SAML 2.0 Deployment Profile, SAML2int, which was planned to receive a much-needed update. The working group would make its needs for the research and education community known so that some could be incorporated into SAML2int; the remaining requirements would go into an R&E-specific deployment profile.
This work was a follow-on initiative recommended by the Federation Interoperability working group which created a profile for SAML software developers. The Federation Interoperability recommended a second profile for deployers of SAML-based services and identity providers.
The Deployment Profile's charter stated the following:
Operating a broadly compatible SAML-based service or identity provider can be challenging. The standards and profiles that are currently available leave a lot of room for interpretation and customization. While this allows for flexibility, it also results in issues that make interoperating in a federation a lot harder than it should be. While deployment standards exist today, the they fall short of solving the whole problem.
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