Workbench authentication process¶

1. In workbench, when the user goes to a page, it checks for a session or ?api_token=xxx in the URL for the API token. If no API token is found, the user is directed to the workbench "welcome" page.
2. In workbench, the "welcome" page has a "log in" button that directs the user to the API server login URL, with a ?return_to=xxx link embedded in the URL.
3. In API server, the 'login' endpoint goes to UserSessionsController#login in the API server. This redirects to /auth/joshid?return_to=xxx
4. In API server, /auth/joshid is intercepted by the OmniAuth Rack middleware and invokes the josh_id OmniAuth strategy.
   1. The josh_id OmniAuth strategy is implemented in arvados/services/api/lib/josh_id.rb and is a subclass of OmniAuth::Strategies::OAuth2
   2. OmniAuth starts the "request_phase" of OmniAuth::Strategies::OAuth2. This redirects to #{options[:custom_provider_url]}/auth/josh_id/authorize using CUSTOM_PROVIDER_URL defined in arvados/services/api/config/initializers/omniauth.rb
5. In sso-provider, /auth/josh_id is routed to AuthController#authorize, and is intercepted by before_filter :authenticate_user! (part of the devise gem)
   1. devise is configured at sso-provider/config/initializers/devise.rb
   2. devise :omniauthable, :omniauth_providers => [:google] configures sso-provider/app/models/user.rb
   3. authenticate_user! is not explicitly defined but instead monkey patched into the controller in devise/lib/devise/controllers/helper.rb
   4. authenticate_user! calls warden.authenticate! (warden/lib/warden/proxy.rb) with a scope of :user (warden is another Rack-based authentication gem)
   5. Warden proxy tries the TokenAuthenticatable and DatabaseAuthenticatable strategies, but these strategies fail and it raises a :warden exception. This causes it to call failure_app which is set up in devise/lib/devise.rb to be Devise::Delegator.new
   6. This maps to devise/lib/devise/failure_app.rb which redirects to the new_user_session_path /users/sign_in which routes to the SSO SessionsController#new which subclasses Devise::SessionsController
6. In sso-provider, SessionsController#new redirects to /users/auth/google

Questions¶

• What is workbench's "secret_token" for?