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Using the Access Control Management API

Reading

Privilege Discovery

Discover/test privileges for the editing session:

  • AccessControlManager
    • hasPrivileges(String, Privilege[])
    • getPrivileges(String)

Discover/test privileges for a set of principal that may differ from those associated with the reading subject. Note that this method requires editing session to be able to have READ_ACCESS_CONTROL permission on the node associated with the specified path.

  • JackrabbitAccessControlManager
    • hasPrivileges(String, Set<Principal>, Privilege[])
    • getPrivileges(String, Set<Principal>, Privilege[])
Note

Usually it is not required for a application to check the privileges/permissions of a given session (or set of principals) as this evaluation can be left to the repository. For rare cases where the application needs to understand if a given set of principals is actually allowed to perform a given action, it is recommend to use Session.hasPermission(String, String) and either pass the actions strings defined by JCR or the names of the Oak permissions.

See section Permissions vs Privileges for an comprehensive overview on the differences between testing permissions on Session and privileges on AccessControlManager.

Reading Policies

  • AccessControlManager

    • getApplicablePolicies(String)
    • getPolicies(String)

  • JackrabbitAccessControlManager

    • getApplicablePolicies(Principal)
    • getPolicies(Principal)
Examples
Read policies bound to a node
AccessControlManager acMgr = session.getAccessControlManager();
AccessControlPolicy[] policies = acMgr.getPolicies("/content");
Read policies that have not yet been bound to the node
AccessControlManager acMgr = session.getAccessControlManager();
AccessControlPolicyIterator it = acMgr.getApplicablePolicies("/content");

Reading Policy Content

  • AccessControlList

    • getAccessControlEntries()

  • JackrabbitAccessControlList

    • getRestrictionNames()
    • getRestrictionType(String)
    • isEmpty()
    • size()

  • PrincipalSetPolicy

    • getPrincipals()

Reading Effective Policies

  • AccessControlManager

    • getEffectivePolicies(String)

  • JackrabbitAccessControlManager

    • getEffectivePolicies(Set<Principal>)

Writing

Adding Policies

  • AccessControlManager
    • setPolicy(String, AccessControlPolicy)
Examples
Bind a policy to a node
AccessControlPolicyIterator it = acMgr.getApplicablePolicies("/content");
while (it.hasNext()) {
    AccessControlPolicy policy = it.nextPolicy();
    if (policy instanceof NamedAccessControlPolicy && "myPolicy".equals((NamedAccessControlPolicy) policy).getName()) {
        acMgr.setPolicy("/content", policy);
        session.save();
    }
}

Modifying Policies

Modification of policies is specific to the policy type. JCR/Jackrabbit API only define a single mutable type of policies: the access control list. Depending on the access control implementation there may be other mutable policies.

  • AccessControlList

    • addAccessControlEntry(Principal, Privilege[])
    • removeAccessControlEntry(AccessControlEntry)

  • JackrabbitAccessControlList

    • addAccessControlEntry(Principal, Privilege[], boolean)
    • addAccessControlEntry(Principal, Privilege[], boolean, Map<String, Value>)
    • addAccessControlEntry(Principal, Privilege[], boolean, Map<String, Value>, Map<String, Value[]>)
    • orderBefore(AccessControlEntry, AccessControlEntry)

  • PrincipalSetPolicy

    • addPrincipals(Principal...)
    • removePrincipals(Principal...)

  • AccessControlUtils

    • getAccessControlList(Session, String)
    • getAccessControlList(AccessControlManager, String)
    • addAccessControlEntry(Session, String, Principal, String[], boolean)
    • addAccessControlEntry(Session, String, Principal, Privilege[], boolean)
    • grantAllToEveryone(Session, String)
    • denyAllToEveryone(Session, String)
Retrieve Principals

The default and recommended ways to obtain Principals for access control management is through the principal management API:

One way of representing principals in the repository is by the means of user management: If user management is supported in a given Oak repository (see OPTION_USER_MANAGEMENT_SUPPORTED repository descriptor), principals associated with a given user/group can be obtained by calling:

Note however, that this will only work for principals backed by a user/group. Principals provided by a different principal management implementation won't be accessible through user management.

Retrieve Privileges

  • PrivilegeManager (see section Privilege Management) - getRegisteredPrivileges() - getPrivilege(String)

  • AccessControlManager

    • getSupportedPrivileges(String)
    • privilegeFromName(String)

  • AccessControlUtils

    • privilegesFromNames(Session session, String... privilegeNames)
    • privilegesFromNames(AccessControlManager accessControlManager, String... privilegeNames)

  • Privilege: defines name constants for the privileges defined by JCR

Examples
Modify an AccessControlList
JackrabbitAccessControlList acl = null;
// try if there is an acl that has been set before
for (AccessControlPolicy policy : acMgr.getPolicies("/content")) {
    if (policy instanceof JackrabbitAccessControlList) {
        acl = (JackrabbitAccessControlList) policy;
        break;
    }
}
if (acl != null) {
    PrincipalManager principalManager = jackrabbitSession.getPrincipalManager();
    Principal principal = principalManager.getPrincipal("jackrabbit");
    Privilege[] privileges = AccessControlUtils.privilegesFromNames(acMgr, Privilege.JCR_READ, Privilege.JCR_WRITE);

    acl.addEntry(principal, privileges, true);
    acMgr.setPolicy(acl.getPath(), acl);
    session.save();
}
Create or Modify an AccessControlList
JackrabbitAccessControlList acl = null;
// try if there is an acl that has been set before
for (AccessControlPolicy policy : acMgr.getPolicies("/content")) {
    if (policy instanceof JackrabbitAccessControlList) {
        acl = (JackrabbitAccessControlList) policy;
        break;
    }
}
if (acl == null) {
    // try if there is an applicable policy
    AccessControlPolicyIterator itr = accessControlManager.getApplicablePolicies("/content");
    while (itr.hasNext()) {
        AccessControlPolicy policy = itr.nextAccessControlPolicy();
        if (policy instanceof JackrabbitAccessControlList) {
            acl = (JackrabbitAccessControlList) policy;
            break;
        }
    }
}
if (acl != null) {
    PrincipalManager principalManager = jackrabbitSession.getPrincipalManager();
    Principal principal = principalManager.getPrincipal("jackrabbit");
    Privilege[] privileges = AccessControlUtils.privilegesFromNames(acMgr, Privilege.JCR_READ, Privilege.JCR_WRITE);

    acl.addEntry(principal, privileges, true);
    acMgr.setPolicy(acl.getPath(), acl);
    session.save();
}

or alternatively use AccessControlUtils:

JackrabbitAccessControlList acl = AccessControlUtils.getAccessControlList(session, "/content");
if (acl != null) {
    PrincipalManager principalManager = jackrabbitSession.getPrincipalManager();
    Principal principal = principalManager.getPrincipal("jackrabbit");
    Privilege[] privileges = AccessControlUtils.privilegesFromNames(session, Privilege.JCR_READ, Privilege.JCR_WRITE);

    policy.addEntry(principal, privileges, true);
    acMgr.setPolicy(acl.getPath(), acl);
    session.save();
}

Removing Policies

  • AccessControlManager
    • removePolicy(String, AccessControlPolicy)
Examples
Remove a policy
for (AccessControlPolicy policy : acMgr.getPolicies("/content");
    if (policy instanceof NamedAccessControlPolicy && "myPolicy".equals((NamedAccessControlPolicy) policy).getName()) {
        acMgr.removePolicy("/content", policy);
        session.save();
    }
}

Access Control on Repository Level

Examples
Allow a Principal to Register Namespaces
JackrabbitAccessControlList acl = AccessControlUtils.getAccessControlList(session, null);
if (acl != null) {
    PrincipalManager principalManager = jackrabbitSession.getPrincipalManager();
    Principal principal = principalManager.getPrincipal("dinosaur");
    Privilege[] privileges = AccessControlUtils.privilegesFromNames(session, PrivilegeConstants.JCR_NAMESPACE_MANAGEMENT);

    policy.addEntry(principal, privileges, true);
    acMgr.setPolicy(null, acl);
    session.save();
}