OpenIDConnect

Client library for consuming and working with OpenID Connect Providers

OpenIDConnect is built and maintained by DockYard, contact us for expert Elixir and Phoenix consulting.

Installation

Available in Hex, the package can be installed as:

Add openid_connect to your list of dependencies in mix.exs:

def deps do
  [{:openid_connect, "~> 0.1.1"}]
end

Getting Started

Configuration

You should add the configuration settings for each of your providers into one of your app’s configuration:

config :my_app, :openid_connect_providers,
  google: [
    discovery_document_uri: "https://accounts.google.com/.well-known/openid-configuration",
    client_id: "CLIENT_ID",
    client_secret: "CLIENT_SECRET",
    redirect_uri: "https://example.com/session",
    response_type: "code",
    scope: "openid email profile"
  ]

You must setup with your provider first. Your provider will have the correct data to provider for the config settings above.

Most major OAuth2 providers have added support for OpenIDConnect. See a short list of most major adopters of OpenIDConnect.

You can add multiple providers in the list. The key for each provider is just a reference that you’ll use with the OpenIDConnect module in your app code.

Worker

Next add the OpenIDConnect.Worker to your app’s supervisor along with your provider configs.

children =
  [
    worker(OpenIDConnect.Worker, [Application.get_env(:my_app, :openid_connect_providers)]),
  ]

opts = [strategy: :one_for_one, name: DockYard.Supervisor]
Supervisor.start_link(children, opts)

Usage

In your app code you will need to do a few things:

  1. Expose the authorization_uri for the provider(s)
  2. Have your app handle the redirect from the provider
  3. Fetch the JWT
  4. Verify the JWT from the provider
  5. Read the claim payload to set whatever session data your app requires

Exposing the authorization uri

You can build the correct authorization URI for a provider with:

OpenIDConnect.authorization_uri(:google)

In this case we are requesting that OpenIDConnect build the authorization URI for the :google provider that we setup on in configuration above. You should use this URI for your users to link out to for authenticating with the given provider

Handling the redirect from the provider

You will need an endpoint for the provider to redirect to after the user has authenticated. This is where the remainder of your steps will take place.

Fetch the JWT

The JSON Web Token (JWT) must be fetched, using the key/value pairs from the response_type params that were part of the redirect to your application:

{:ok, tokens} = OpenIDConnect.fetch_tokens(:google, %{code: params["code"]})

Verify the JWT

The JWT is encrypted and it should always be verified with the JSON Web Keys (JWK) for the provider:

{:ok, claims} = OpenIDConnect.verify(:google, tokens["id_token"])

The claims is a payload with the information from the scopes you requested of the provider.

Read the claims and set your app’s user session

Now that you have the claims payload you can use the user data to identify and set the user’s session state for your app. Setting your app’s session state is outside the scope of this library.

Phoenix Example

# router.ex
get("/session", SessionController, :create)
get("/session/authorization-uri", SessionController, :authorization_uri)

# session_controller.ex
# you could also take the `provider` as a query param to pass into the function
def authorization_uri(conn, _params) do
  json(conn, %{uri: OpenIDConnect.authorization_uri(:google)})
end

# The `Authentication` module here is an imaginary interface for setting session state
def create(conn, params) do
  with {:ok, tokens} <- OpenIDConnect.fetch_tokens(:google, params["code"]),
       {:ok, claims} <- OpenIDConnect.verify(:google, tokens["id_token"]),
       {:ok, user} <- Authentication.call(:google, Repo, claims) do

    conn
    |> put_status(200)
    |> render(UserView, "show.html", data: user)
  else
    _ -> send_resp(conn, 401, "")
  end
end

Authors

We are very thankful for the many contributors

Versioning

This library follows Semantic Versioning

Looking for help with your Elixir project?

At DockYard we are ready to help you build your next Elixir project. We have a unique expertise in Elixir and Phoenix development that is unmatched. Get in touch!

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Want to help?

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DockYard, Inc. © 2018

@dockyard

Licensed under the MIT license