Shared Code for Login Users and Management

Implementation

At this point, we've decided to go BrowserID for authentication and a standardized JSON file for authorization.

Authentication

We've https://browserid.org/

http://accordion.lbl.gov/cgi-bin/browserid/secret

http://geneontology.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/geneontology/installations/browserid/secret?view=log

Discussion points

Wish list

Interchangeable backends

An implementation should have the ability to run off of the local filesystem (for a smaller group sized app) or communicate with a remote third-party server. To some extent, the former may be more important.

Also, we don't want to get locked into depending on a third-party for access (and neither should people downstream from us).

Reusable user identities

A person could have a single login across multiple GO applications. Similarly, if somebody did implement their own backend server, they'd be able to use it for single identities across multiple pieces of our software (or use it as a base for their own).

Simple management

It would be nice if there was an easy easy to add and drop users, as well as control what permissions they had for applications that used this system.

Also, role-based users would be a good way to handle application permissions.

Question: How many roles are envisaged? I can think of three: user (can use designated apps), admin (can add/drop users, give/revoke permission to use apps) and admin (can do everything). Do we need more than that? Fewer?

Simple implementation (many languages)

It would be very nice if this was not locked into a single language. This would either mean that is relatively easy and has been implemented many times with a lot of client and server libraries (like OpenID) or had a web API that makes it easy to interoperate with alien software.

Easy maintenance

The simpler the implementation the better. A layer of software and a small sqlite3 database that can be easily copied = good. Multiple high-availability servers needing synchronized clocks = bad.

One-stop shopping

It would be nice to handle everything through a single unified interface (thinking about Drupal users and permissions here).

Risks

Things that we're particularly worried about in an implementation.

Accidental exposure

This would cover things like web crawlers somehow finding an "erase all" link

Hacking

I think in general we're not super worried about security (for example, a man in the middle after login was something that got a lot of shrugs), but want the general bases covered. As we're not security experts, reusing a tested stack by somebody else would be nice.

Other practical concerns

We're not super happy about running and maintaining a database for logins. But this can be punted for now as we want local use and the immediate applications are of such small scope.

Packages considered

Login/Authentication	Roles/Auth	Notes
OpenID	OAuth	Unsure how to tie together and handle management. Running our own OpenId server we could have local control of sign-on but also allow entry from other OpenId providers (eg, Google). We would then not be dependent on a 3rd party but would have the convenience of the 3rd party for people who are already signed on from said 3rd party. There are implementations in numerous languages of both the server and client. My reading of OAuth seems like it's intended for different servers to exchange data without forcing the User to sign onto both. It could could probably be used for role regulation, but might be overkill.
Drupal		Seems heavy when all we would want is the user code
LDAP		...
Stanford WebAuth		Cookie-based; open source; requires Apache and Kerberos or LDAP
Central Authentication Service		Enterprise level single sign-on; open source; java server and client libraries for Apache, Drupal, Java, PAM, PHP, Perl, Ruby, etc.

Consumers

• GOLD database administration
• TermGenie