context-access

Powerful access control with a dead simple API. Build any access control scheme you need by allowing maps of arbitrary keys and values called contexts.

• Simple — just two API methods.
• Powerful — flexible enough to build any API scheme.
• Browser support — works on the client or server.

Installation

Node

Using npm:

npm install context-access

Browser

Using component:

component install bloodhound/context-access

Example

The simplest example is a traditional roles-based access control system:

var access = require('context-access');
 
access.allow({
  url: '/public',
  role: 'guest'
});
 
access.assert({
  url: '/public'
});
// => false

The call to assert returns false because the properties in the context asserted do not match any allowed context. However, if we add a matching role property:

access.allow({
  url: '/public',
  role: 'guest'
});
 
access.assert({
  url: '/public',
  role: 'guest'
});
// => true

AND and OR operations

You can imbricate arrays to alternate AND and OR operations when asserting:

["role1", "role1"]                role1 AND role2
[["role1", "role2"]]              role1 OR role2
["role1", ["role2", "role3"]]     role1 AND (role2 OR role3)
 
access.allow({
  url: '/private',
  roles: [['manager', 'admin']]
});
 
access.assert({
  roles: 'manager'
});
// => true

Express middleware

Use contexts to match routes in Express:

var app = require('express')();
var access = require('context-access');
 
// Allow users with manager or admin role to POST to /users
access.allow({
  path: '/users',
  method: [['GET', 'POST']]
  role: [['manager', 'admin']],
});
 
// Route middleware
var authorize = function(req, res, next) {
  var context = {
    role: req.session.role,   // admin
    path: req.path,           // /users
    method: req.method        // POST
  };
  if (access.assert(context)) {
    return next();
  }
  else {
    res.send(403, 'You must be an admin to do this!');
  }
};
 
// Use route middleware
app.post('/users', authorize, function(req, res) {
  // ...
});

API

exports.allow(context)

Allow a given context when asserted.

exports.assert(context)

Assert a given context. Returns true or false if it is allowed or denied.

If there's no definition for a key in the given context, then it is ignored.

Browser support

Firefox, Chrome, Safari, IE9+

Tests

Tests are written with mocha and should using BDD-style assertions.

Run them with npm:

npm test

MIT Licensed