Surprisingly, there aren't many users who blogged about OIM 10g. If I was a newbie, I would find it increasingly difficult to put the pieces together.
This is why I have put together a few posts regarding the information. 10g (9.1.0.2) is a dying version though thats not to say people aren't using it.

I am not going to waste my time writing about the features of OIM, there's enough companies who will 'market-the-balls' out of OIM and how it's the strategic product solution delivering awesome functionalities blah blah blah.

Instead, I will simply say it does the four following things:

• User Administration
• Provisioning & De-provisioning
• Password Management
• Identity Synchronization

I will use specific terminologies throughout the blog so it's vital for you to know what I mean

• Resource - A type of application like Active Directory
  e.g. an application = Active Directory
• Resource Object - a specific server/endpoint of the resource
  e.g. a Server) = ADServer1

As I mentioned before, I will begin to explain OIM in layman terms.

• Bob wants to gain access to a ADServer1.
• Bob submits a request within OIM,
• Bob's manager approve the request
• The Data owner of ADServer1 approves the request
• The request is sent from OIM to ADServer1 of which the request is then granted

• Bob want to gain access to the Resource object ADServer1,
• Bob submits a resource object form to gain access to the ADServer1
• The manager receives the request and is displayed with the resource object form - The manager accepts the request
• The Data Owner then receives the resource object form, and also approves the request
• Once all the requests are made, OIM then creates a process form and submits that to the resource object.

The resource object is actually a 'virtual' representation of a resource though you will pick that up quite quickly once you start playing around with the product The relationship between these features are fundamental to the true understanding of the product. Hope this small understanding puts you into a good stride.

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