Authenticate Via External Cookie

Requirements

The external cookie authentication alternative may be a good choice for your installation if your MoinMoin wiki topic is closely associated with some other application. You may be using MoinMoin for application documentation, popup help functions, or bug tracking. Several of your application pages may have hyperlinks to wiki pages. Wiki pages may contain custom macros that present data from your application database. Wiki users must login before they can update wiki pages (or you wish that were the case). Everyone with an application login ID also has a wiki login ID. Your users are annoyed that they frequently must login twice, first to the other application and then to MoinMoin. Your administrators are annoyed because they must maintain login IDs in two places.

To authenticate a MoinMoin user with an external cookie, your other application must be modified to create a cookie with each successful login. It must delete the cookie as part of the logout process.

In order to prevent hackers from easily creating their own cookie, MoinMoin transactions need to authenticate the cookie. One way to do this is to modify your other application to store a hash of the cookie value in a database, file, or other secure shared storage area that can be accessed by MoinMoin.

Strategy

The MoinMoin wiki code will be customized in two places. wikiconfig.py will be modified to create a new ExternalCookie class that will be used to authenticate a user. Logging in to your other application will effectively log you in to the wiki. Logging off of your other application will log you out of the wiki. Several variables will be added to wikiconfig.py to customize the Settings:Preferences page and to automatically create new user records when required.

Your wiki themes may be modified to override the username method of the Theme class. This method generates the login and logout hyperlinks within the wiki navigation area. These hyperlinks will be customized to point to the login and logout pages of your other application.

You must modify your other application as outlined above to create/delete a cookie and (optionally) add/delete entries to a shared storage area. If your wiki users can read the wiki without logging in, you may want to modify your other application login page so a wiki reader (logging in from a wiki page) will be returned to their referred-from page after login is complete (similar to the way MoinMoin login works).

Alternative Strategies Not Implemented

It is probably best to not synchronize inactivity timeouts between the other application and the wiki. If a logged in user on the other application times out after an hour of inactivity, he can continue to edit and save pages on the wiki provided the other application timeout process is not modified to delete the entry in the shared storage area. If the other application timed-out user logs in again, a new entry in the shared storage area will be created and a new MoinAuth cookie generated -- subsequent wiki transactions will use the new cookie. The example wikiconfig.py contains an example showing how inactive entries might be removed from a MySQL table soon after expiration by a MoinMoin transaction. However, most installations will probably choose to clear obsolete entries in the shared storage area with a process embedded in the other application.

One alternative to the use of a shared storage area is to encrypt the cookie in the other application and decrypt the cookie in the external_auth method. If this method were implemented, the addition of a timestamp to the cookie value could force cookies to timeout with the addition of an aging check. Without the aging check, any cookie generated would be valid forever (a minor issue) or until the encryption keys were changed. Brief tests with the ezPyCrypto example programs were discouraging because of the amount of compute time required. MySQL was faster -- the measured wall time to validate the cookie was usually 0 seconds and always less than 0.02 seconds.

Another possibility to thwart the use of stolen cookies is to add the authenticated user's IP address to the cookie value and then check it against the IP address of the incoming MoinMoin transaction. But this has marginal value because some ISPs (AOL) change the low order bits of the IP address with each transaction and in other cases several users could appear to be coming from the same IP address.

ExternalCookie Class

The first step is to override the external_auth method of the Config class by adding the code snippet below to your wikiconfig.py.

The code below is for Moin 1.9.

• edit your wikiconfig.py or farmconfig.py

• find the line containing class Config(DefaultConfig): or class FarmConfig(DefaultConfig):

• replace the above line with all of the code below

• if using farmconfig.py find and comment/uncomment the appropriate class statements

 1 # +++++++++++++++ beginning of external_cookie example
 2 
 3 # This is some sample code you might find useful when you want to use some
 4 # external cookie (made by some other program, not moin) with moin.
 5 # See the +++ places for customizing it to your needs. Copy this
 6 # code into your farmconfig.py or wikiconfig.py by pasting it over the current:
 7 #
 8 # class Config(DefaultConfig):
 9 # OR
 10 # class FarmConfig(DefaultConfig):
 11 
 12 
 13 from MoinMoin.config.multiconfig import DefaultConfig
 14 from MoinMoin.auth import BaseAuth
 15  
 16 # This is included in case you want to create a log file during testing 
 17 import time
 18 def writeLog(*args): 
 19  '''Write an entry in a log file with a timestamp and all of the args.'''
 20  s = time.strftime('%Y-%m-%d%H:%M:%S ',time.localtime())
 21  for a in args:
 22  s = '%s%s;' % (s,a)
 23  log = open('/somelogfile', 'a') # +++ location for log file
 24  log.write('\n' + s + '\n')
 25  log.close()
 26  return
 27  
 28 # these 2 methods are examples of how to "authenticate" the other application cookie
 29 import MySQLdb
 30 def verifySession(sidHash): # +++ to use this, uncomment a procedure call below in ExternalCookie
 31  """Return True if sidHash value exists (meaning user is currently logged on), false otherwise. 
 32 
 33  If you are not a MySQL user, find another way to store this information. ActiveSession is a two-column table
 34  containing a hashed cookie value (sidHash) plus a date-time stamp (tStamp).
 35  Your other application must add an entry to this table each time a user logs on and delete the entry when the user logs off.
 36  """
 37  db = MySQLdb.connect(db='mydb',user='myid',passwd='mypw') #+++ user ID needs read access
 38  c = db.cursor()
 39  q = 'select sidHash from ActiveSession where sidHash="%s"' % sidHash
 40  result = c.execute(q)
 41  c.close()
 42  if result == 1:
 43  return True
 44  return False
 45  
 46 def verifySessionPlus(sidHash,timeout=3600*4): # +++ to use this, uncomment a procedure call below in ExternalCookie
 47  """Return True if sidHash value exists (meaning user is currently logged on), false otherwise. 
 48 
 49  This version of verifySession deletes entries inactive for more than 4 hours and
 50  updates the tStamp field with each moin transaction. If performance is 
 51  important, find another way to delete inactive sessions.
 52  """
 53  db = MySQLdb.connect(db='mydb',user='myid',passwd='mypw') # +++ user ID needs write access
 54  c = db.cursor()
 55  q = 'delete from ActiveSession where tStamp<"%s"' % int(time.time() - timeout) # delete inactive entries
 56  result = c.execute(q)
 57  q = 'update ActiveSession set tStamp=%s where sidHash="%s"' % (int(time.time()),sidHash)
 58  result = c.execute(q)
 59  c.close()
 60  if result == 1:
 61  return True
 62  return False
 63  
 64 
 65 class ExternalCookie(BaseAuth):
 66  name = 'external_cookie'
 67  # +++ The next 2 lines may be useful if you are overriding the username method in your themes.
 68  # +++ If commented out, wiki pages will not have login or logout hyperlinks
 69  login_inputs = ['username', 'password'] # +++ required to get a login hyperlink in wiki navigation area
 70  # logout_possible = True # +++ required to get a logout hyperlink in wiki navigation area
 71  
 72  def __init__(self, autocreate=False):
 73  self.autocreate = autocreate
 74  BaseAuth.__init__(self)
 75 
 76  def request(self, request, user_obj, **kw):
 77  """Return (user-obj,False) if user is authenticated, else return (None,True). """
 78  # login = kw.get('login') # +++ example does not use this; login is expected in other application
 79  # user_obj = kw.get('user_obj') # +++ example does not use this
 80  # username = kw.get('name') # +++ example does not use this
 81  # logout = kw.get('logout') # +++ example does not use this; logout is expected in other application
 82  import Cookie
 83  user = None # user is not authenticated
 84  try_next = True # if True, moin tries the next auth method in auth list
 85  
 86  otherAppCookie = "MoinAuth" # +++ username, email,useralias, session ID separated by #
 87  try:
 88  cookie = Cookie.SimpleCookie(request.cookies) #moin 1.9
 89  except Cookie.CookieError:
 90  cookie = None # ignore invalid cookies
 91 
 92  if cookie and otherAppCookie in cookie: # having this cookie means user auth has already been done in other application
 93  import urllib
 94  if sys.version_info[:2] > (2, 5):
 95  cookievalue = cookie[otherAppCookie].value # moin 1.9 & python 2.6
 96  else:
 97  cookievalue = cookie[otherAppCookie] # moin 1.9 & python 2.5
 98  # writeLog('cookievalue',cookievalue)
 99  # +++ decode and parse the cookie value - edit this to fit your needs.
 100  #~ cookievalue = urllib.unquote(cookievalue) # cookie value is urlencoded, decode it moin 1.9
 101  #~ cookievalue = cookievalue.decode('iso-8859-1') # decode cookie charset to unicode moin 1.9
 102  cookievalue = cookievalue[1: -1] # strip leading and ending quotes moin 1.9
 103  # writeLog('cookievalue',cookievalue)
 104  cookievalues = cookievalue.split('#') # cookie has format loginname#email#aliasname#sessionid
 105 
 106  email = aliasname = sessionid = ''
 107  try: # extract fields from other app cookie
 108  auth_username = cookievalues[0] # the wiki username
 109  email = cookievalues[1] # email is required for user to change and save userpreferences
 110  aliasname = cookievalues[2] # aliasname is useful only if auth_username is not wiki-like
 111  sessionid = cookievalues[3] # optional other app session ID -- a unique timestamp or random number 
 112  except IndexError: 
 113  pass # do not need aliasname or sessionid unless you uncomment lines below
 114  # writeLog('auth_username',auth_username)
 115  # writeLog('email',email)
 116  # writeLog('aliasname',aliasname)
 117  # writeLog('sessionid',sessionid)
 118 
 119  # +++ any hacker can create a cookie, uncomment these lines to verify the cookie was created by the other application
 120  if auth_username:
 121  import hashlib # +++ python 2.5; see http://code.krypto.org/python/hashlib for 2.3, 2.4 download
 122  sidHash = hashlib.md5(cookievalue).hexdigest() # moin 1.9
 123  # writeLog('sidHash',sidHash)
 124  sidOK = verifySession(sidHash) # verify user is currently logged on to the other application +++ or use verifySessionPlus
 125  if not sidOK:
 126  auth_username = None
 127  # writeLog('auth_username after verifySession',auth_username)
 128  
 129  if auth_username:
 130  # we have an authorized user, create the moin user object
 131  from MoinMoin.user import User
 132  # giving auth_username to User constructor means that authentication has already been done.
 133  user = User(request, name=auth_username, auth_username=auth_username, auth_method=self.name)
 134  changed = False
 135  if email != user.email: # was the email addr externally updated?
 136  user.email = email ; 
 137  changed = True # yes -> update user profile
 138  # if aliasname != user.aliasname: # +++ was the aliasname externally updated?
 139  # user.aliasname = aliasname ; 
 140  # changed = True # yes -> update user profile
 141 
 142  if user:
 143  user.create_or_update(changed)
 144  if user and user.valid: 
 145  try_next = False # have valid user; stop processing auth method list
 146  # writeLog(str(user), try_next)
 147  return user, try_next 
 148 
 149 from MoinMoin.config import multiconfig, url_prefix_static
 150 
 151 class Config(multiconfig.DefaultConfig):
 152 # class FarmConfig(multiconfig.DefaultConfig):
 153 
 154  auth = [ExternalCookie(autocreate=True)] # only way to login is external application # autocreate parameter new in 1.8.0
 155  
 156  # +++ these are suggested changes to the user preferences form if the external_cookie is the only auth method
 157  user_form_disable = ['name', 'aliasname', 'email',] # don't let the user change these, but show them:
 158  user_form_remove = ['password', 'password2', 'css_url', 'logout', 'create', 'account_sendmail','jid'] # remove completely:
 159  #~ user_autocreate = True # +++ Moin will autocreate new user ID if none exists
 160  cookie_lifetime = (12, 12) # (anonymous,logged-in) default (0,12) page trails for anonymous users moin 1.9
 161 
 162 # +++++++++++++++ end of external_cookie example, your custom configurations continue below 

Initial Testing

If you use the Firefox browser and have the Web Developer addon extension installed, initial testing will be fast and painless. Log on to your other application and click on Tools... Web Developer... Cookies... View Cookie Information. You will probably find at least one cookie that looks like a session identifier created by your application at login, usually these will have a value with a large random number and perhaps a time stamp.

Next, click on Tools... Web Developer... Cookies... Add Cookie. Give the cookie a name of MoinAuth (case sensitive). Set the value to yourname#youremail@yourprovider.com with no spaces, and be sure to use the # character as a separator. If your other application and the wiki run on the same host, set the host to the same value used by your other application (if not, omit the host from the domain name to share cookies across hosts). Set the path value to "/" without the quotes. Click the Session Cookie check box and click save.

Open a second browser window and load your starting wiki page. The wiki should recognize you as a logged in user. Do a quick test to verify that you can edit and save a wiki page and verify that you can change your User Preferences.

Changing the Other Application

The example external_cookie method expects the cookie value to contain several pieces of information separated with the # character:

• the wiki user id -- always required

• the user's email address -- needed if the user is to be able to update and save MoinMoin User Preferences

• user alias -- usually not required, used to override user IDs that are not wiki-like user names
• unique session ID -- a big random number or timestamp and random number

Your application must store the MoinAuth cookie with a path set to '/'. Setting the path to '/' is normally not recommended because it presents a small security risk. It allows an application to read the cookies created by a different application. In this case, that is exactly our intent -- MoinMoin must be able to read the cookies set by the other application.

As you have already demonstrated to yourself above, any user with the skill to install the Firefox Web Developer addon could easily create a cookie and hack his way into the wiki using someone else's ID. To prevent this from happening, MoinMoin will need to validate the cookie value against an entry in a secure shared storage area created by the other application.

We want to avoid creating a potential new security issue by building a cross-reference of user ID to session ID or even a list of session IDs that might be of use to a hacker. A better way is for your application to hash (not encrypt) the MoinAuth cookie value and store the result in a secure shared storage area. Add a timestamp to each entry so obsolete entries can be removed later.

There is commented out code in the example wikiconfig.py to perform a hash of the cookie contents and validate the result against a MySQL table. In addition, there is alternative commented out code that will delete entries from the MySQL table that are more than 4 hours old, validate the hashed cookie value against the table and update the timestamp. A better method is to modify the other application to remove obsolete entries from the table, perhaps each time a user logs in.

As you begin to modify your application almost all of your testing can be done with the Firefox Web Developer extension. Before you login to the other application there should be no MoinAuth cookie, after login there should be a MoinAuth cookie, after logout there should be no cookie. In addition, the shared storage area should be updated with a new hashed cookie value after login and cleared after logout. Accessing a wiki page after you are logged in will cause moin to create a MOIN_SESSION cookie.

Modifying themes

The next step is to modify the login and logout links in the navigation area of wiki pages. If you limit your users to one theme, modify the code below to point to your other application's login and logoff pages. If you allow users to choose from among several themes, it may be easiest to modify the /MoinMoin/theme/init.py script directly.

If you always log on to your other application before accessing a wiki page, this modification and the one following are not required. If you comment out the login_inputs and logout_possible variables near the top of the ExternalCookie class, then your wiki pages will not contain login and logout hyperlinks.

The code below is for moin 1.9.

 1  def username(self, d):
 2  """ Assemble the username / userprefs link
 3 
 4  @param d: parameter dictionary
 5  @rtype: unicode
 6  @return: username html
 7  """
 8  request = self.request
 9  _ = request.getText
 10 
 11  userlinks = []
 12  # Add username/homepage link for registered users. We don't care
 13  # if it exists, the user can create it.
 14  if request.user.valid and request.user.name:
 15  interwiki = wikiutil.getInterwikiHomePage(request)
 16  name = request.user.name
 17  aliasname = request.user.aliasname
 18  if not aliasname:
 19  aliasname = name
 20  title = "%s @ %s" % (aliasname, interwiki[0])
 21  # link to (interwiki) user homepage
 22  homelink = (request.formatter.interwikilink(1, title=title, id="userhome", generated=True, *interwiki) +
 23  request.formatter.text(name) +
 24  request.formatter.interwikilink(0, title=title, id="userhome", *interwiki))
 25  userlinks.append(homelink)
 26  # link to userprefs action
 27  if 'userprefs' not in self.request.cfg.actions_excluded:
 28  userlinks.append(d['page'].link_to(request, text=_('Settings'),
 29  querystr={'action': 'userprefs'}, id='userprefs', rel='nofollow'))
 30 
 31  if request.user.valid: 
 32  if request.user.auth_method in request.cfg.auth_can_logout:
 33  userlinks.append('<a href="/myapp/Logout">%s</a>' % _('Logout', formatted=False)) # +++ other app logout page
 34  else:
 35  query = {'action': 'login'}
 36  # special direct-login link if the auth methods want no input
 37  if request.cfg.auth_login_inputs == ['special_no_input']:
 38  query['login'] = '1'
 39  if request.cfg.auth_have_login:
 40  userlinks.append('<a href="/myapp/Login">%s</a>' % _("Login", formatted=False)) # +++ other app login page
 41 
 42  userlinks = [u'<li>%s</li>' % link for link in userlinks]
 43  html = u'<ul id="username">%s</ul>' % ''.join(userlinks)
 44  return html

Modifying the Application Login Page

As a final touch, you may want to consider modifying your login page for wiki users who decide to login from a wiki page. This depends upon your choice of web servers, but most will pass something similar to an HTTP_REFERER field which will contain the prior URL.

Check this value to determine if the referrer page was a wiki page, if so save the URL and at the end of a successful logon either redirect the current page back the referring wiki page or open a new window with the URL of the referring page.