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Note: Use of a PEP and Fedora-specific authorization is optional. You can also configure Fedora to run without API security. You may want to only enforce container authentication or leave the service running completely unsecured, behind a firewall for instance. For details, see How to configure Fedora without authorization.

Fedora Administrators (fedoraAdmin user role)

The PEP is not consulted when servlet credentials identify a client with the fedoraAdmin role. When the container has authenticated the connected client as a fedoraAdmin, all actions are permitted and we bypass the PEP completely.

PEP Implementions

The PEP is an extension point for which there are several reference implementations available:

• Basic Role-based PEP - A PEP that operates on three fixed roles that may be assigned throughout the repository tree. (reader, writer, admin)
• Local XACML PEP - Enforces a set of XACML policies stored in the repository and linked to the repository tree. XACML engine is within the ModeShape JVM.
• Local XACML Role-based PEP and PDP - Same as above, but includes support for arbitrary role assignment in the repository tree.

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• repo.xml:  the global repository configuration file.  Three beans enable the PEP extension:
  
  • modeshapeRepoFactory:  should contain a dependency on the authenticationProvider bean
  • authenticationProvider:  should specify the ServletContainerAuthenticationProvider class, so that the servlet container handles authentication
    
    • This bean should have a property "pep" that points to the pep bean, to enable the servlet container authentication provider to use the PEP
  • pep: should point to your class with the PEP implementation 
• repository.json:  the ModeShape configuration file.  It contains a security section, where the internal session authentication between Fedora and the ModeShape storage layer is configured.  Note that the roles configured here do not apply to end user authentication and authorization..

Step-by-step:

1. Open the repo.xml file in your Fedora web application.
2. Add your PEP implementation as a bean in this file and give it the id of "pep". Your PEP bean may include more specific configuration details than the example.
3. Now add the Fedora ModeShape Authentication Provider bean. (see repo.xml example)
4. Make sure that your modeshapeRepofactory bean has the depends-on attribute pointing at the authenticationProvider (see repo.xml example).
5. Open your repository.json file.
6. Add org.fcrepo.auth.ServletContainerAuthenticationProvider as a provider in the security section. (see repository.json example)

Example repo.xml (repository and security beans)

<bean name="modeshapeRepofactory" class="org.fcrepo.kernel.spring.ModeShapeRepositoryFactoryBean"
  depends-on="authenticationProvider">
    <property name="repositoryConfiguration" value="${fcrepo.modeshape.configuration:repository.json}" />
</bean>

<bean name="pep" class="your.own.implementation.PEP"/>

<bean name="authenticationProvider" class="org.fcrepo.auth.ServletContainerAuthenticationProvider">
  <property name="pep" ref="pep"/>
</bean>

Example repository.json (security section)

"security" : {
  "anonymous" : {
    "roles" : ["readonly","readwrite","admin"],
    "useOnFailedLogin" : false
  },
  "providers" : [
    { "classname" : "org.fcrepo.auth.ServletContainerAuthenticationProvider" }
  ]
},