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configuration:permission_options

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Permission Configuration

VuFind 2.4 introduced a configurable permission system, allowing access to certain features of the system to be restricted based on a variety of options such as username, login status, IP address, etc. All of the available rules and permissions are documented in permissions.ini.

VuFind 4.1 added another layer of configuration to the system: the ability to configure exactly what VuFind will do when a particular permission is denied. Permissions may be checked in either controllers or templates, and different options are available for denied permissions in each of these places. A controller may throw an exception or display a custom “access denied” message; a template may suppress portions of its output, or display alternate content in the form of a text message or custom sub-template. These newer features are controlled by, and documented within, permissionBehavior.ini.

Structure of permissionBehavior.ini

Each permission rule (sections in permissions.ini) can get a section in permissionBehavior.ini. Please use the name of the permission rule as specified in the permission attribute in permissions.ini as the section name in permissionBehavior.ini. Each section in permissionBehavior.ini may have two attributes: deniedTemplateBehavior and deniedControllerBehavior.

deniedTemplateBehavior controls the display of template content associated with the permission. If you want to show the content only to people who have logged in, you could define a permission rule in permissions.ini and reference that in permissionBehavior.ini, setting deniedTemplateBehavior to null (as illustrated in an Example below).

deniedControllerBehavior controls VuFind's behavior if someone tries to access a page that has been restricted at the controller level.

As noted above, all possible values for these options are documented in permissionBehavior.ini.

See also the following examples, which should illustrate some use cases with permissionBehavior.

Checking permissions in code

Starting with VuFind 4.1, the code includes some convenient tools to help with permission management.

Controllers

Since VuFind 2.4, it has been possible to make a controller check a particular permission before dispatching any actions. A controller simply needs to set its $accessPermission property to the name of a permission from permissions.ini to enforce this simple check.

VuFind 4.0 added the $accessDeniedBehavior property, which a controller can set to either 'promptLogin' or 'exception' to control how a blocked permission will be handled.

VuFind 4.1 added even greater flexibility by adding permissionBehavior.ini (which overrides $accessDeniedBehavior for configured permissions, and defaults back to it for others) and by adding the permission controller plugin. The permission controller plugin makes it possible to check a permission and implement appropriate behavior at the action level, allowing greater granularity than the previous controller-level checking. Simply add code like this to the top of your action to implement the necessary check:

// Check permission:
$defaultBehavior = 'promptLogin'; // this could be any valid deniedControllerBehavior setting from permissionBehavior.ini
$response = $this->permission()->check('your.permission.name', $defaultBehavior);
if (is_object($response)) {
    return $response;
}

Templates

It was not possible to check permissions in templates until VuFind 4.1, which introduced the permission view helper. This can be used in templates like this:

<? if ($this->permission()->allowDisplay('your.permission.name')): ?>
  You have permission to see this block of code!
<? elseif ($block = $this->permission()->getAlternateContent('your.permission.name')): ?>
  <?=$block?>
<? endif; ?>

Examples

Some examples to illustrate use cases for these configuration options:

Global settings

Show login page unless overridden

If a user accesses a restricted page, show a login page as default (unless a deniedControllerBehavior directive overrides that).

PermissionBehavior.ini:

[global] 
defaultDeniedControllerBehavior = "promptlogin" 

Show custom message unless overridden

If a user accesses a restricted page, show a note as default (unless a deniedControllerBehavior directive overrides that).

PermissionBehavior.ini:

[global] 
defaultDeniedControllerBehavior = "showMessage:my custom message" 

Admin Module

Only users from certain IPs are allowed to use the AdminModule. If an unauthorized user enters the Admin module, show a note.

Permissions.ini:

[default.AdminModule] 
ipRange = "10.0.0.1" 
permission = access.AdminModule 

permissionBehavior.ini:

[access.AdminModule] 
deniedControllerBehavior = "showMessage:You must be on-campus" 

Favorites

  • The button to save a record as a favorite record should be only displayed, after a user has logged in.

Permissions.ini:

[default.favoritesSave] 
role[] = loggedin 
permission = favorites.save 

PermissionBehavior.ini:

[favorites.save] 
permissionDeniedDisplayLogic = "showMessage:" 
  • The button to save a record as a favorite record should be always displayed, but if a user is not logged in, he should be forced to login.

That's the default in VuFind now.

Permissions.ini:

[default.favoritesSave] 
role[] = loggedin 
permission = favorites.save 

PermissionBehavior.ini:

[favorites.save] 
permissionDeniedAction = "promptlogin" 

Primo Central

  • You are using the PrimoCentral index and are offering it with a seperate register (SearchTab). The user should be allowed to see the register tab only, if he is in a certain IP range. Otherwise the search tab should not get displayed.

Permissions.ini:

[default.primo] 
require = ANY 
ipRange = "10.0.0.0-10.254.254.254" 
role[] = loggedin 
permission = access.Primo 

PermissionBehavior.ini:

[access.Primo] 
permissionDeniedDisplayLogic = "showMessage:" 
  • You are using the PrimoCentral index and are offering it with a seperate register (SearchTab). Any user should be allowed to see the register tab, but if the tab is clicked, the user should see a note telling him that he needs to be in a certain IP range to use this tab.

Permissions.ini:

[default.primo] 
require = ANY 
ipRange = "10.0.0.0-10.254.254.254" 
role[] = loggedin 
permission = access.Primo 

PermissionBehavior.ini:

[access.Primo] 
permissionDeniedAction = "showMessage:permission_denied_primoaccess" 
  • You are using the PrimoCentral index and are offering it with a seperate register (SearchTab). Any user should be allowed to see the register tab, but if the tab is clicked, system should throw an exception.

Permissions.ini:

[default.primo] 
require = ANY 
ipRange = "10.0.0.0-10.254.254.254" 
role[] = loggedin 
permission = access.Primo 

PermissionBehavior.ini:

[access.Primo] 
permissionDeniedAction = "exception:Forbidden:You are not allowed to do this!" 
configuration/permission_options.1504103332.txt.gz · Last modified: 2017/08/30 14:28 by demiankatz