Creating and Consuming SAML 2.0 Tokens using WIF

With the introduction of Windows Identity Foundation 4.5 Microsoft removed the Visual Studio templates that could be used to generate a custom WCF STS service. The custom STS could then be used to issue SAML 2.0 tokens based on custom credentials passed with the WS-Trust request to the custom STS.

The underlying classes are still available to use for creating a custom STS, without the templates available it is still possible to create a custom WCF STS service but it requires a bit more effort.

There is however an alternate means to generate SAML 2.0 tokens using WIF that forgoes the need to create a custom STS. This is useful in scenarios involving proprietary systems that have custom protocols and authentication, that also do not lend themselves well to integration with ADFS etc.

To explain how this can be achieved I will break the problem down into two parts:

Part 1: Creating a SAML 2.0 Token using WIF 4.5

Part2: Consuming a SAML 2.0 Token using WIF 4.5