ADR014: User Authentication for Products

Status: accepted
Deciders:
- Natalie Klestrup Röijezon
- Sönke Liebau
- Jim Halfpenny
- Sebastian Bernauer
Date: 2022-03-03

Technical Story: https://github.com/stackabletech/issues/issues/170

Context and Problem Statement

Customers will generally want to configure all user-facing products to authenticate the user against a common user directory. We’re aiming for a unified user experience when authenticating users in different products.

Decision Drivers

Multiple authentication systems and protocols exist, and not all products support all protocols
The cluster administrator will typically want to use the same underlying authentication system for all services

Considered Options

Manage authentication configuration inline in the ProductCluster CRD
Introduce a new ProductAuthentication CRD per product that the ProductCluster CRD refers to
Introduce a new AuthenticationClass CRD that the product CRDs reference

Decision Outcome

Option 3: Introduce a new AuthenticationClass CRD that the product CRDs reference

Pros and Cons of the Options

Authentication in `ProductCluster`

We embed a the authentication settings directly into the product’s primary CRD. This would look something like:

apiVersion: nifi.stackable.tech/v1alpha1
kind: NifiCluster
metadata:
  name: nifi
spec:
  authenticationConfig:
    methods:
    - ldap:
        hostname: ldap.server
        port: 389
        domain: domain.local
        bindCredentialsSecret: nifi-ldap-bind-credentials

Good, because we can expose exactly the options that each product supports
Good, because it is (relatively) simple to implement and requires no new components
Bad, because it will be difficult to keep the option schema consistent between Stackable operators
Bad, because it will be difficult for customers to keep their configuration synchronized across their Stackable Data Platform installation
Bad, because it forces application administrators to know about authentication directory details

`ProductAuthentication` CRD per product

Every product defines its own CRD that contains exactly the authentication options that that product supports. For example:

apiVersion: nifi.stackable.tech/v1alpha1
kind: NifiCluster
metadata:
  name: nifi
spec:
  authenticationConfig:
    methods:
    - nifi-ldap-authn
---
apiVersion: nifi.stackable.tech/v1alpha1
kind: NifiAuthenticationMethod
metadata:
  name: nifi-ldap-authn
spec:
  ldap:
    hostname: ldap.server
    port: 389
    domain: domain.local
    bindCredentials:
      secretClass: nifi-ldap-bind-credentials
      scope: Service

Good, because we can expose exactly the options that each product supports
Good, because it allows separation of ownership between products and authentication system
Bad, because it will be difficult to keep the option schema consistent between Stackable operators
Bad, because it will be difficult for customers to keep their configuration synchronized across their Stackable Data Platform products
Bad, because it forces authentication administrators to know about each product

Global `AuthenticationClass`

We define a common AuthenticationClass CRD that we try to share between all operators. It’s cluster-scoped so that a LDAP bind can be shared between multiple namespaces. For example:

apiVersion: nifi.stackable.tech/v1alpha1
kind: NifiCluster
metadata:
  name: nifi
spec:
  authenticationConfig:
    methods:
    - authenticationClass: ldap-1
    - authenticationClass: ldap-2
      ldapOverwrite: # optional
        ignoreCase: true
    - authenticationClass: kerberos # We check for the correct AuthenticationClass type => Otherwise we throw a warning
      kerberosOverwrite: # optional. we have to check for the correct overwrite type => Warning otherwise. Is we try ldapOverwrite to kerberos AuthenticationClass they will be ignored
        udp: true
---
apiVersion: auth.stackable.tech/v1alpha1
kind: AuthenticationClass
metadata:
  name: ldap-1
spec:
  ldap: # Enum(ldap, kerberos, etc.)
    hostname: ldap.server
    port: 389
    domain: domain.local
    bindCredentials:
      secretClass: ldap-bind-credentials
      scope: Service
---
apiVersion: auth.stackable.tech/v1alpha1
kind: AuthenticationClass
metadata:
  name: kerberos
spec:
  kerberos:
    ticketServer: my.kerberos.server
    realm: myrealm

Here, bindCredentials is specified as a reference to a SecretClass, which allows secret-operator to bind in separate credentials for each cluster (or even Pod, depending on how things are set up) that uses the AuthenticationClass, while letting a cluster administrator centralize the management of the AuthenticationClass.

Good, because it allows complete separation between product and authentication ownership
Good, because it allows a single interface for authentication owners to integrate with
Good, because it enforces a consistent interface between Stackable operators
Bad, because it requires us to set up a new commons operator with the AuthenticationClass CRD
Bad, because it requires introducing a new dependency on the commons operator for all Stackable operators
Bad, because not all options (either whole authentication providers or individual config fields) are supported by all products. Additional options can be specified in the ProductCluster authenticationConfig section.

Initially we will start to implement the AuthenticationClass in a concrete operator as a spike. Before releasing the new CRD it will be moved into a new separate operator that contains common CRDs that are shared between all operators (there will be some other shared CRDs in the future)