Using XACML to define access control policy in information system

Access control is widely used in most information systems. XML or other languages are usually adopted to define access control policy. In this paper, we examine an approach to employ user and role's attribute expression as a part of access control policy. In our approach, a XACML-based policy language named A-XACML is defined and used as a simple, flexible way to express and enforce access control policies in a variety of environments. The language and schema support include data types, functions, and combining logic which allow simple and complex rules to be defined. Finally, we illustrate how to define access control policies of product document management (PDM) system by using XACML.