To understand the Windows Security

There are many references existing in MSDN to talk about Windows Security. Some of them are for the new users, but some of them are for experienced users or even programmers. Moreover, they explain the concepts in different ways for different version of Windows or .NET Framework. It's still frustrating to search through all those documents and check them one by one.

During search the fundamental comprehensive documents, I found this link is quite useful:
[MS-SECO]: Windows Security Overview
Not only you can learn the overall fundamental knowledge of Windows security online, but you can aslo download the whole topics in PDF format from the link side to read offline.

Actually, when you go upper level of the we site, you will find that link provides many documents for all Windows protocols:
Windows Protocols

And Microsoft keeps updating those documents!

Reference links about "Role-Based Security, Principal, and Identity" of .NET Framework

Here are some basic important links to explain the security concepts of Windows.


.NET Securiy Overview (Althought it applies to .NET Framework 1.1)
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa302422.aspx

Security Policy Model:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ck90k585.aspx

Security Permissions:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/5ba4k1c5(VS.80).aspx

1. Code Access Permissions: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/h846e9b3(VS.80).aspx


2. Identity Permissions: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/d3wktt6a(VS.80).aspx


3. Role-Based Security Permissions: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/7sxk9k2h(VS.80).aspx

Introduction of Role-Based Security:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/shz8h065(VS.80).aspx

Introduction of Cose Access Security:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/c5tk9z76(VS.80).aspx

What is "Principal"?
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/axt6w9h8(VS.80).aspx

Principal and Identity Objects:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ftx85f8x(VS.80).aspx

The principal object encapsulates:

• An identity object: .NET Framework identity objects represent users.
• A role: Roles represent membership and securiy contexts. A SecurityContext object captures all security-related information for a logical thread, including the information contained in the WindowsIdentity and CompressedStack objects.

.NET Framework application grant rights to the principal based on its identiy or, more commonly, its role membership.

What is "Evidence"?
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/7y5x1hcd(VS.80).aspx

Security Context:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.security.securitycontext(VS.80).aspx

Credentials Management:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa374789(VS.85).aspx