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openid

OpenID for Node.js

OpenID for Node.js is (yes, you guessed it) an OpenID implementation for Node.js.

Highlights and features include:

  • Full OpenID 1.0/1.1/2.0 compliant Relying Party (client) implementation
  • Very simple API
  • Simple extension points for association state

Download

The library can be reviewed and retrieved from GitHub.

Installation

If you use npm, simply do npm install openid.

Otherwise, you can grab the code from GitHub.

Examples

Here's a very simple server using OpenID for Node.js for authentication:

var openid = require('openid');
var url = require('url');
var querystring = require('querystring');
var relyingParty = new openid.RelyingParty(
    'http://example.com/verify', // Verification URL (yours) 
    null, // Realm (optional, specifies realm for OpenID authentication) 
    false, // Use stateless verification 
    false, // Strict mode 
    []); // List of extensions to enable and include 
 
 
var server = require('http').createServer(
    function(req, res)
    {
        var parsedUrl = url.parse(req.url);
        if(parsedUrl.pathname == '/authenticate')
        { 
          // User supplied identifier 
          var query = querystring.parse(parsedUrl.query);
          var identifier = query.openid_identifier;
 
          // Resolve identifier, associate, and build authentication URL 
          relyingParty.authenticate(identifier, false, function(error, authUrl)
              {
                if (error)
                {
                  res.writeHead(200);
                  res.end('Authentication failed: ' + error.message);
                }
                else if (!authUrl)
                {
                  res.writeHead(200);
                  res.end('Authentication failed');
                }
                else
                {
                  res.writeHead(302, { Location: authUrl });
                  res.end();
                }
              });
        }
        else if(parsedUrl.pathname == '/verify')
        {
            // Verify identity assertion 
            // NOTE: Passing just the URL is also possible 
            relyingParty.verifyAssertion(req, function(error, result)
            {
              res.writeHead(200);
              res.end(!error && result.authenticated 
                  ? 'Success :)'
                  : 'Failure :(');
            });
        }
        else
        {
            // Deliver an OpenID form on all other URLs 
            res.writeHead(200);
            res.end('<!DOCTYPE html><html><body>'
                + '<form method="get" action="/authenticate">'
                + '<p>Login using OpenID</p>'
                + '<input name="openid_identifier" />'
                + '<input type="submit" value="Login" />'
                + '</form></body></html>');
        }
    });
server.listen(80);

A more elaborate example including extensions can be found in sample.js in the GitHub repository.

Supported Extensions

This library comes with built-in support for the following OpenID extensions:

  • The Simple Registration (SREG) 1.1 extension is implemented as openid.SimpleRegistration.
  • The Attribute Exchange (AX) 1.0 extension is implemented as openid.AttributeExchange.
  • The OAuth 1.0 extension is implemented as openid.OAuthHybrid.
  • The User Interface 1.0 extension is implemented as openid.UserInterface.
  • The Provider Authentication Policy Extension 1.0 (PAPE) is implemented as openid.pape.

Storing association state

To provide a way to save/load association state, you need to mix-in two functions in the openid module:

  • saveAssociation(provider, type, handle, secret, expiry_time_in_seconds, callback) is called when a new association is established during authentication. The callback should be called with any error as its first argument (or null if no error occured).
  • loadAssociation(handle, callback) is used to retrieve the association identified by handle when verification happens. The callback should be called with any error as its first argument (and null as the second argument), or an object with the keys provider, type, secret if the association was loaded successfully.

The openid module includes default implementations for these functions using a simple object to store the associations in-memory.

Caching discovered information

The verification of a positive assertion (i.e. an authenticated user) can be sped up significantly by avoiding the need for additional provider discoveries when possible. In order to achieve, this speed-up, node-openid needs to cache its discovered providers. You can mix-in two functions to override the default cache, which is an in-memory cache utilizing a simple object store:

  • saveDiscoveredInformation(key, provider, callback) is used when saving a discovered provider. The following behavior is required:

    • The key parameter should be uses as a key for storing the provider - it will be used as the lookup key when loading the provider. (Currently, the key is either a claimed identifier or an OP-local identifier, depending on the OpenID context.)
    • When saving fails for some reason, callback(error) is called with error being an error object specifying what failed.
    • When saving succeeds, callback(null) is called.

  • loadDiscoveredInformation(key, callback) is used to load any previously discovered information about the provider for an identifier. The following behavior is required:

    • When no provider is found for the identifier, callback(null, null) is called (i.e. it is not an error to not have any data to return).
    • When loading fails for some reason, callback(error, null) is called with error being an error string specifying why loading failed.
    • When loading succeeds, callback(null, provider) is called with the exact provider object that was previously stored using saveDiscoveredInformation.

Proxy Support

node-openid makes HTTP and HTTPS requests during authentication. You can have these requests go through a proxy server, by using the following environment variables:

  • HTTP_PROXY_HOST and HTTP_PROXY_PORT control how http:// requests are sent
  • HTTPS_PROXY_HOST and HTTPS_PROXY_PORT control how https:// requests are sent

License

OpenID for Node.js is licensed under the MIT license. See LICENSE for further details.

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Keywords

openid, auth, authentication, identity, identifier, relying, party, 1.1, 2.0, library

Dependencies (1)

request

Dependents (30)

dreamface, express-openid, stf, everyauth-latest, steam-login, icp, bentojs-api-auth, passport-azure-ad-fixed, passport-supinfo, 1-1-help-desk-system, crafity-everyauth, connect-auth, expressive-auth, everyauth-goellan, google-openid, coffee-box, connect-googleapps, connect-googleapps-hd, everyauth-express3, simple-openid, passport-ppige-npdc, passport-w3openid, sub-login, everyauth, passport-openid-node6support, easynode, passport-openid, electron-steam-openid, passport-ubuntu, and more