A comprehensive solution for adding keycloak Authentication and Authorization to your Express based GraphQL server.
Based on the keycloak-connect middleware for Express. Provides useful Authentication/Authorization features within your GraphQL application.
🔒 Auth at the GraphQL layer. Authentication and Role Based Access Control (RBAC) on individual Queries, Mutations and fields.
⚡️ Auth on Subscriptions. Authentication and RBAC on incoming websocket connections for subscriptions.
🔑 Access to token/user information in resolver context via context.kauth
(for regular resolvers and subscriptions)
📝 Declarative @auth
and @hasRole
directives that can be applied directly in your Schema.
⚙️ auth
and hasRole
middleware resolver functions that can be used directly in code. (Alternative to directives)
npm install keycloak-connect-graphql
There are 3 steps to set up keycloak-connect-graphql
in your application.
- Add the
KeycloakTypeDefs
along with your own type defs. - Add the
KeycloakSchemaDirectives
(Apollo Server) - Add the
KeycloakContext
tocontext.kauth
The example below shows a typical setup with comments beside each of the 3 steps mentioned.
const { ApolloServer, gql } = require('apollo-server-express')
const Keycloak = require('keycloak-connect')
const { KeycloakContext, KeycloakTypeDefs, KeycloakSchemaDirectives } = require('keycloak-connect-graphql')
const { typeDefs, resolvers } = require('./schema')
const app = express()
const keycloak = new Keycloak()
app.use(graphqlPath, keycloak.middleware())
const server = new ApolloServer({
typeDefs: [KeycloakTypeDefs, typeDefs], // 1. Add the Keycloak Type Defs
schemaDirectives: KeycloakSchemaDirectives, // 2. Add the KeycloakSchemaDirectives
resolvers,
context: ({ req }) => {
return {
kauth: new KeycloakContext({ req }) // 3. add the KeycloakContext to `kauth`
}
}
})
server.applyMiddleware({ app })
app.listen({ 4000 }, () =>
console.log(`🚀 Server ready at http://localhost:4000${server.graphqlPath}`)
)
In this example keycloak.middleware()
is used on the GraphQL endpoint. This allows for Authentication and Authorization at the GraphQL Layer. keycloak.middleware
parses user token information if found, but will not block unauthenticated requests. This approach gives us the flexibility to implement authentication on individual Queries, Mutations and Fields.
In Apollo Server, the @auth
and @hasRole
directives can be used directly on the schema.
This declarative approach means auth logic is never mixed with business logic.
const { KeycloakContext, KeycloakTypeDefs, KeycloakSchemaDirectives } = require('keycloak-connect-graphql')
const typeDefs = gql`
type Article {
id: ID!
title: String!
content: String!
}
type Query {
listArticles: [Article]! @auth
}
type Mutation {
publishArticle(title: String!, content: String!): Article! @hasRole(role: "editor")
}
`
const resolvers = {
Query: {
listArticles: (obj, args, context, info) => {
return Database.listArticles()
}
},
mutation: {
publishArticle: (object, args, context, info) => {
const user = context.kauth.accessToken.content // get the user details from the access token
return Database.createArticle(args.title, args.content, user)
}
}
}
const server = new ApolloServer({
typeDefs: [KeycloakTypeDefs, typeDefs], // 1. Add the Keycloak Type Defs
schemaDirectives: KeycloakSchemaDirectives, // 2. Add the KeycloakSchemaDirectives
resolvers,
context: ({ req }) => {
return {
kauth: new KeycloakContext({ req }) // 3. add the KeycloakContext to `kauth`
}
}
})
In this example a number of things are happening:
@auth
is applied to thelistArticles
Query. This means a user must be authenticated for this Query.@hasRole(role: "editor")
is applied to thepublishArticle
Mutation. This means the keycloak user must have the editor client role in keycloak- The
publishArticle
resolver demonstrates howcontext.kauth
can be used to get the keycloak user details
keycloak-connect-graphql
also exports the auth
and hasRole
logic directly. They can be thought of as middlewares that wrap your business logic resolvers. This is useful if you don't have a clear way to use schema directives (e.g. when using graphql-express
).
const { auth, hasRole } = require('keycloak-connect-graphql')
const resolvers = {
Query: {
listArticles: auth(listArticlesResolver)
},
mutation: {
publishArticle: hasRole('editor')(publishArticleResolver)
}
}
@hasRole
directive
The syntax for the @hasRole
schema directive is @hasRole(role: "rolename")
or @hasRole(role: ["array", "of", "roles"])
hasRole
- The usage for the exported
hasRole
function ishasRole('rolename')
orhasRole(['array', 'of', 'roles'])
Both the @hasRole
schema directive and the exported hasRole
function work exactly the same.
- If a single string is provided, it returns true if the keycloak user has a client role with that name.
- If an array of strings is provided, it returns true if the keycloak user has at least one client role that matches.
By default, hasRole checks for keycloak client roles.
- Example:
hasRole('admin')
will check the logged in user has the client role named admin.
It also is possible to check for realm roles and application roles.
hasRole('realm:admin')
will check the logged in user has the admin realm rolehasRole('some-other-app:admin')
will check the loged in user has the admin realm role in a different application
The KeycloakSubscriptionHandler
provides a way to validate incoming websocket connections to SubscriptionServer
from subscriptions-transport-ws
for subscriptions and add the keycloak user token to the context
in subscription resolvers.
Using onSubscriptionConnect
inside the onConnect
function, we can parse and validate the keycloak user token from the connectionParams
. The example below shows the typical setup that will ensure all subscriptions must be authenticated.
const { KeycloakSubscriptionHandler } = require('keycloak-connect-graphql')
// Apollo Server Setup Goes Here. (See Getting Started Section)
const httpServer = app.listen({ port }, () => {
console.log(`🚀 Server ready at http://localhost:${port}${server.graphqlPath}`)
const keycloakSubscriptionHandler = new KeycloakSubscriptionHandler({ keycloak })
new SubscriptionServer({
execute,
subscribe,
schema: server.schema,
onConnect: async (connectionParams, websocket, connectionContext) => {
const token = await keycloakSubscriptionHandler.onSubscriptionConnect(connectionParams)
return {
kauth: new KeycloakSubscriptionContext(token)
}
}
}, {
server: httpServer,
path: '/graphql'
})
})
In this example, keycloakSubscriptionHandler.onSubscriptionConnect
parses the connectionParams into a Keycloak Access Token. The value returned from onConnect
becomes the context
in subscription resolvers. By returning { kauth: new KeycloakSubscriptionContext }
we will have access to the keycloak user token in our subscription resolvers.
By default, onSubscriptionConnect
throws an Authentication Error
and the subscription is cancelled if invalid connectionParams
or an expired/invalid keycloak token is supplied. This is an easy way to force authentication on all subscriptions.
For more information, please read the generic apollo documentation on Authentication Over Websockets.
The auth
and hasRole
middlewares can be used on individual subscriptions. Use the same code to from the Authentication and Authorization on Subscriptions example but intialise the KeycloakSubscriptionHandler
with protect:false
.
const keycloakSubscriptionHandler = new KeycloakSubscriptionHandler({ keycloak, protect: false })
When protect
is false, an error will not be thrown during the initial websocket connection attempt if the client is not authenticated. Instead, the auth
and hasRole
middlewares can be used on the individual subscription resolvers.
const { auth, hasRole } = require('keycloak-connect-graphql')
const typeDefs = gql`
type Message {
content: String!
author: String
}
type Comment {
content: String!
author: String
}
type Subscription {
commentAdded: Comment!
messageAdded: Message! @auth
alertAdded: String @hasRole(role: "admin")
}
`
const resolvers = {
Subscription: {
commentAdded: {
subscribe: () => pubsub.asyncIterator(COMMENT_ADDED)
},
messageAdded: {
subscribe: auth(() => pubsub.asyncIterator(COMMENT_ADDED))
},
alertAdded: hasRole('admin')(() => pubsub.asyncIterator(ALERT_ADDED))
}
}
In this hypothetical application we have three subscription type that have varying levels of Authentication/Authorization
- commentAdded - Unauthenticated users can subscribe.
- messageAdded - Only authenticated users can subscribe.
- alertAdded - Only authenticated user with the
admin
client role can subscribe.
The GraphQL client should provide the following connectionParams
when attempting a websocket connection.
{
"Authorization": "Bearer <keycloak token value>"
}
The example code shows how it could be done on the client side using Apollo Client.
import Keycloak from 'keycloak-js'
import { WebSocketLink } from 'apollo-link-ws'
var keycloak = Keycloak({
url: 'http://keycloak-server/auth',
realm: 'myrealm',
clientId: 'myapp'
})
const wsLink = new WebSocketLink({
uri: 'ws://localhost:5000/',
options: {
reconnect: true,
connectionParams: {
Authorization: `Bearer ${keycloak.token}`
}
})
See the Apollo Client documentation for Authentication Params Over Websocket.
See the Keycloak Documentation for the Keycloak JavaScript Adapter
The examples
folder contains runnable examples that demonstrate the various ways to use this library.
examples/basic.js
- Shows the basic setup needed to use the library. Useskeycloak.connect()
to require authentication on the entire GraphQL API.examples/advancedAuth
- Shows how to use the@auth
and@hasRole
schema directives to apply auth at the GraphQL layer.examples/authMiddlewares
- Shows usage of theauth
andhasRole
middlewares.subscriptions
- Shows basic subscriptions setup, requiring all subscriptions to be authenticated.subscriptionsAdvanced
- Shows subscriptions that use theauth
andhasRole
middlewares directly on subscription resolvers.
Prerequisites:
- Docker and docker-compose installed
- Node.js and NPM installed
Start by cloning this repo.
git clone https://github.com/aerogear/keycloak-connect-graphql/
Then start a Keycloak server using docker-compose
.
cd examples/config && docker-compose up
Now in a separate terminal, seed the keycloak server with a sample configuration.
$ npm run examples:seed
creating role admin
creating role developer
creating client role admin for client keycloak-connect-graphql-bearer
creating client role developer for client keycloak-connect-graphql-bearer
creating client role admin for client keycloak-connect-graphql-public
creating client role developer for client keycloak-connect-graphql-public
creating user developer with password developer
assigning client and realm roles called "developer" to user developer
creating user admin with password admin
assigning client and realm roles called "admin" to user admin
done
This creates a sample realm called keycloak-connect-graphql
with some clients, roles and users that we can use in the examples.
Now we are ready to start and explore the examples.
The Keycloak console is accessible at localhost:8080 and the admin login is admin/admin
. You can make any configuration changes you wish and npm run examples:seed
will always recreate the example realm from scratch.
The basic example shows:
- The setup of the keycloak express middleware
- How to add Role Based Access Control using the
@hasRole
schema directive.
In examples/basic.js
the GraphQL schema for the server is defined:
const typeDefs = gql`
type Query {
hello: String @hasRole(role: "developer")
}
`
The @hasRole
directive means only users with the developer
role are authorized to perform the hello
query. Start the server to try it out.
$ node examples/basic.js
🚀 Server ready at http://localhost:4000/graphql
Open the URL and you will see the Keycloak login screen. First login with developer/developer
as the username/password.
Now you should see the GraphQL Playground.
NOTE: The login page is shown because the Keycloak middleware is enforcing authentication on the /graphql
endpoint using a public
client configuration. A public client is being used so we can access the GraphQL Playground in the browser. In production, your GraphQL API would use a bearer
client configuration and instead you would receive an Access Denied
message.
On the right side of the GraphQL Playground you will see a message:
{
"error": "Failed to fetch. Please check your connection"
}
Although the browser has authenticated with the Keycloak server, the GraphQL playround isn't sending the keycloak Authorization
header along with its requests to the GraphQL server. In the bottom left corner of the playground there is a field called HTTP Headers which will be added to requests sent by the playground.
Use scripts/getToken.js
to get a valid header for the developer
user.
node scripts/getToken.js developer developer # username password
{"Authorization":"Bearer <token string>"}
Copy the entire JSON object, then paste it into the HTTP Headers field in the playground. The error message should disappear.
Now try the following query:
query {
hello
}
You should see the result.
{
"data": {
"hello": "Hello developer"
}
}
The hasRole
directive checked that the user had the appropriate role and then the GraphQL resolver successfully executed. Let's change the role. Change the code in examples/basic.js
to the code below and then restart the server.
const typeDefs = gql`
type Query {
hello: String @hasRole(role: "admin")
}
`
Now run the query in the playground again. You should see an error.
{
"errors": [
{
"message": "User is not authorized. Must have one of the following roles: [admin]",
"locations": [
{
"line": 2,
"column": 3
}
],
"path": [
"hello"
],
"extensions": <omitted>
}
],
"data": {
"hello": null
}
}
This time an error comes back saying the user does not have the right role. That's the full example! The process of running and trying the other examples is very similar. Feel free to try them or to look at the code!