How do I get Shiro's annotations to work in Grails? - grails

Question

I'm trying to apply annotation-based security to my Grails app.
Peter says here that we should be using Shiro's annotations instead of the quasi-deprecated grails-shiro plugin annotations.
How does one get that working?
I'm finding the grails-shiro plugin strays from how Shiro does things, what with the Realm-converting and all. Has anyone tried implementing Shiro directly rather than using the grails plugin? Any success?
Thanks,
Graham.

Answer 1

G'day I have taken over the Grails-Shiro plugin project. I'm currently re-writing the functional tests and can confirm that the shiro annotations do work, with a couple of caveats:
You can use them in controllers on method actions in grails 2.x
You can use them on Service methods
They don't currently work on service classes (I'm investigating this)
e.g. this works on a service
class SecuredMethodsService {
def methodOne() {
return 'one'
}
#RequiresGuest
def methodTwo() {
return 'two'
}
#RequiresUser
def methodThree() {
return 'three'
}
#RequiresAuthentication
def methodFour() {
return 'four'
}
#RequiresRoles('User')
def methodFive() {
return 'five'
}
#RequiresPermissions("book:view")
def methodSix() {
return 'six'
}
}
or in a controller on an action method like this:
#RequiresAuthentication
def unrestricted() {
render(view: 'simple', model: [msg: "secure action"])
}
When using annotations you may need to add an "afterView" filter to catch the AuthorizationException thrown by the annotation e.g.
class ShiroSecurityFilters {
def filters = {
all(uri: "/**") {
before = {
// Ignore direct views (e.g. the default main index page).
if (!controllerName) return true
// Access control by convention.
accessControl()
}
afterView = { e ->
while (e && !(e instanceof AuthorizationException)) {
e = e.cause
}
if (e instanceof AuthorizationException) {
if (e instanceof UnauthenticatedException) {
// User is not authenticated, so redirect to the login page.
flash.message = "You need to be logged in to continue."
redirect(
controller: 'auth',
action: 'login',
params: [targetUri: request.forwardURI - request.contextPath])
} else {
redirect(controller: 'auth', action: 'unauthorized')
}
}
}
}
}
}
I hope that helps. A new version of the plugin should be released RSN.
Cheers,
Peter.

Answer 2

Since nobody is anwering...
I don't know how you get the annotations to work, but I've used shiro in several Grails projects and didn't miss them... So why do you need them?
When you need to permission explicit roles, you can just create some ShiroRoles and assign star-permissions to them: 'book:*' allows a role to execute all actions on the book controller. 'book:list,show' allows a role to only list or show books.
When you need implicit permissions, use a filter. So if you want to give someone access if she is (for instance) the boss of someone, just fetch the object on which you want to decide in a filter and make a decision.
When you need switches in you gsp-code (e.g. show this only if it's an admin), use the shiro tags. Just unzip the shiro plugin and look for the taglibrary. It is well documented.
HTH