NAME

Connector::Multi

DESCRIPTION

This class implements a Connector that is capable of dealing with dynamically configured Connector implementations and symlinks.

The underlying concept is that there is a primary (i.e.: boot) configuration source that Multi accesses for get() requests. If the request returns a reference to a SCALAR, Multi interprets this as a symbolic link. The content of the link contains an alias and a target key.

Examples

Connector References

In this example, we will be using a YAML configuration file that is accessed via the connector Connector::Proxy::YAML.

From the programmer's view, the configuration should look something like this:

  smartcards:
    tokens:
        token_1:
            status: ACTIVATED
        token_2:
            status: DEACTIVATED
    owners:
        joe:
            tokenid: token_1
        bob:
            tokenid: token_2

In the above example, calling get('smartcards.tokens.token_1.status') returns the string 'ACTIVATED'.

To have the data fetched from an LDAP server, we can redirect the 'smartcards.tokens' key to the LDAP connector using '@' to indicate symlinks. Our primary configuration source for both tokens and owners would contain the following entries:

  smartcards:
    tokens@: connector:connectors.ldap-query-token
    owners@: connector:connectors.ldap-query-owners

With the symlink now in the key, Multi must walk down each level itself and handle the symlink. When 'smartcards.tokens' is reached, it reads the contents of the symlink, which is an alias to a connector 'ldap-query-token'. The connector configuration is in the 'connectors' namespace of our primary data source.

  connectors:
    ldap-query-tokens:
      class: Connector::Proxy::Net::LDAP
      basedn: ou=smartcards,dc=example,dc=org
      uri: ldaps://example.org
      bind_dn: uid=user,ou=Directory Users,dc=example,dc=org
      password: secret

  connectors:
    ldap-query-owners:
      class: Connector::Proxy::Net::LDAP
      basedn: ou=people,dc=example,dc=org
      uri: ldaps://example.org
      bind_dn: uid=user,ou=Directory Users,dc=example,dc=org
      password: secret

Builtin Environment Connector

Similar to connector you can define a redirect to read a value from the environment.

    node1:
        key@: env:OPENPKI_KEY_FROM_ENV

calling get('node1.key') will return the value of the environment variable `OPENPKI_KEY_FROM_ENV`.

If the environment variable is not set, undef is returned. Walking over such a node raises a warning but will silently swallow the remaining path components and return the value of the node.

Inline Redirects

It is also possible to reference other parts of the configuration using a kind of redirect/symlink.

    node1:
       node2:
          key@: shared.key1

    shared:
       key1: secret

The '@' sign indicates a symlink similar to the example given above but there is no additional keyword in front of the value and the remainder of the line is treated as an absolute path to read the value from.

If the path value starts with the path separator (default 'dot'), then the path is treated as a relative link and each dot means "one level up".

    node1:
       node2:
          key2@: ..node2a.key

       node2a:
          key1@: .key
          key: secret

SYNOPSIS

The parameter BASECONNECTOR may either be a class instance or the name of the class, in which case the additional arguments (e.g.: LOCATION) are passed to the base connector.

  use Connector::Multi;

  my $multi = Connector::Multi->new( {
    BASECONNECTOR => $base,
  });

  my $tok = $multi->get('smartcard.owners.bob.tokenid');

or...

  use Connector::Multi;

  my $multi = Connector::Multi->new( {
    LOCATION => $path_to_internal_config_git_repo,
  });

  my $tok = $multi->get('smartcard.owners.bob.tokenid');

You can also pass the path as an arrayref, where each element can be a path itself

  my $tok = $multi->get( [ 'smartcard.owners', 'bob.tokenid' ]);

*Preset Connector References*

If you create your config inside your code you and have a baseconnector that can handle object references (e.g. Connector::Builtin::Memory), you can directly set the value of a node to a blessed reference of a Connector class.

    my $sub = Connector::Proxy::Net::LDAP->new( {
        basedn => "ou=smartcards,dc=example,dc=org"
    });

    $base->set('smartcard.tokens',  $sub )

OPTIONS

When creating a new instance, the new() constructor accepts the following options:

BASECONNECTOR

This is a reference to the Connector instance that Connector::Multi uses at the base of all get() requests.

PREFIX

You can set a PREFIX that is prepended to all path. There is one important caveat to mention: Any redirects made are relative to the prefix set so you can use PREFIX only if the configuration was prepared to work with it (e.g. to split differnet domains and switch between them using a PREFIX).

    Example:

      branch:
        foo@: connector:foobar

        foobar:
          class: ....

Without a PREFIX set, this will return "undef" as the connector is not defined at "foobar".

    my $bar = $multi->get( [ 'branch', 'foo', 'bar' ]);

This will work and return the result from the connector call using "bar" as key:

    my $multi = Connector::Multi->new( {
      BASECONNECTOR => $base,
      PREFIX => "branch",
    });
    my $bar = $multi->get( [ 'branch', 'foo', 'bar' ]);

Note: It is DANGEROUS to use a dynamic PREFIX in the BASECONNECTOR as Connector::Multi stores created sub-connectors in a cache using the path as key. It is possible to change the prefix of the class itself during runtime.

Supported methods

get, get_list, get_size, get_hash, get_keys, set, get_meta Those are routed to the appropriate connector.

get_connector Return the instance of the connector at this node

get_wrapper Return a wrapper around this node. This is like setting a prefix for all subsequent queries.

   my $wrapper = $conn->get_wrapper('test.node');
   $val = $wrapper->get('foo');

Is the same as $val = $conn->get_wrapper('test.node.foo');

cpanm Connector

perl -MCPAN -e shell
install Connector