JWT Simple Server

A light-weight, dynamic jwt server for ASP.NET Core 2.1

What is the motivation behind it?

JWT Simple server arises from the need of having an ease-to-use JWT server in ASP.NET, avoiding the user all the ceremony configuration and providing additional features.

What JWT Simple Server offers?

• Easy to use JWT Server, configured with a few lines of code.
• Flexible and customizable. You can provide your own authentication and store mechanisms.
• Implements middleware that exposes the token endpoint so you don't have to create and mantain your own.
• Provides refresh tokens feature with several store implementations (InMemory, Entity Framework, Redis, Message Pack).
• Provides a typescript library that will allow you to interact with JWT Server easily. This library offers a JWT Client to request and refresh access tokens and a refresh token automatic renewal service.

Getting Started

1. Install the standard Nuget package into your ASP.NET Core application.

   Install-Package JWTSimpleServer
   

   Install-Package JWTSimpleServer.InMemoryRefreshTokenStore
   

2. Create your own IAuthenticationProvider for user authentication. You should execute context.success and provide the user claims that will be encoded in the token or context.Reject if the authentication was not successful.

   public class CustomAuthenticationProvider : IAuthenticationProvider
   {
       public Task ValidateClientAuthentication(JwtSimpleServerContext context)
       {
           if(context.UserName == "demo" && context.Password == "demo")
           {
               var claims = new List<Claim>();
               claims.Add(new Claim(ClaimTypes.Name, "demo"));
   
               context.Success(claims);
           }
           else
           {
               context.Reject("Invalid user authentication");
           }
           
           return Task.CompletedTask;            
       }
   }

3. In the ConfigureServices method of Startup.cs, register JWTSimpleServer services, defining one refresh token store (Optional: By default we register NoRefreshTokenStore implementation).

   public void ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services)
   {
       services
           .AddSingleton<IAuthenticationProvider, CustomAuthenticationProvider>()
           .AddJwtSimpleServer(setup =>
           {
               setup.IssuerSigningKey = SigningKey;
           })
           .AddJwtInMemoryRefreshTokenStore();
   }

4. In the Configure method, add the middleware to the server exposing the token endpoint and handling it's requests.

   public void Configure(IApplicationBuilder app, IHostingEnvironment env)
   {
         app.UseJwtSimpleServer(setup =>
         {
             setup.IssuerSigningKey = SigningKey;
         });
   }

5. Two grant types are supported right now by the server: password and refresh_token

   A password grant type request will require username and password parameters and will allow you to obtain an access token.

   Sample request:

   POST https://localhost:44305/Token HTTP/1.1
   Host: localhost:44305
   User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3; WOW64; rv:32.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/32.0
   Accept: */*
   Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded; charset=UTF-8
   X-Requested-With: XMLHttpRequest
   Referer: https://localhost:44305/
   Content-Length: 68
   
   grant_type=password&username=demo&password=demo

   HTTP Response

   {
   	"access_token": "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9....",
   	"expires_in": 900,
   	"refresh_token": "77e248a4a3814308931d63b10fb1e7f7"
   }

   A refresh_token grant type will allow you to generate a new access token with a new expiry time and obtain a new refresh token. (The previous refresh token will be invalidated once used).

   The required parameter for this grant type is the refresh token you were previously provided.

   Sample request:

   POST https://localhost:44305/Token HTTP/1.1
   Host: localhost:44305
   User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3; WOW64; rv:32.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/32.0
   Accept: */*
   Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded; charset=UTF-8
   X-Requested-With: XMLHttpRequest
   Referer: https://localhost:44305/
   Content-Length: 68
   
   grant_type:refresh_token&refresh_token:77e248a4a3814308931d63b10fb1e7f7

   HTTP Response

   {
   	"access_token": "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9....",
   	"expires_in": 900,
   	"refresh_token": "3521442655fc4ec5b41a1b2d9ce846aa"
   }

Available stores

JWT Simple Server has four different store implementations:

• In-memory store

   public void ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services)
   {
       services
           .AddSingleton<IAuthenticationProvider, CustomAuthenticationProvider>()
           .AddJwtSimpleServer(setup =>
           {
               setup.IssuerSigningKey = SigningKey;
           })
           .AddJwtInMemoryRefreshTokenStore();
   }

• Entity framework store

    public void ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services)
       {
           services
               .AddScoped<IAuthenticationProvider, CustomAuthenticationProvider>()
               .AddJwtSimpleServer(options => options.IssuerSigningKey = SigningKey)
               .AddJwtEntityFrameworkCoreRefreshTokenStore(options =>
               {
                   options.ConfigureDbContext = builder =>
                   {
                       builder.UseSqlServer(
                           Configuration["ConnectionStrings:DefaultConnection"],
                           sqlServerOptions => sqlServerOptions.MigrationsAssembly(typeof(Startup).Assembly.FullName));
                   };
               });                
       }

• Redis store

public void ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services)
      {
          services.AddSingleton<IAuthenticationProvider, CustomAuthenticationProvider>()
          .AddJwtSimpleServer(setup =>
          {
              setup.IssuerSigningKey = SigningKey;
          })
          .AddDistributedRedisRefreshStokenStore( setup =>
          {
            setup.Configuration = "localhost"; //Provide your redis server configuration
            setup.InstanceName = "JwtSimpleServerInstance";
          });          
      }

• Message pack binary store

public void ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services)
      {
          services.AddSingleton<IAuthenticationProvider, CustomAuthenticationProvider>()
          .AddJwtSimpleServer(setup =>
          {
              setup.IssuerSigningKey = SigningKey;
          })
          .AddJwtMessagePackRefreshTokenStore(setup =>
          {
              setup.Path = "MyBinaryStore.bin";
          });           
      }

You can create your own store service by implementing IRefreshTokenStore interface and registering it in the inversion of control container.

Samples

We have some samples with different store configurations available here.

If you launch the projects you can try a simple playground to get access tokens and try the refresh token renewal service.

Typescript library

The typescript library will allow you to easily interact will the token endpoint.

Follow this steps to create your client if you are using the browser bundled library:

NPM - Installing the library

npm install jwt-simpleserver-client --save

1. Create the client options

var defaultServerOptions = new JwtSimpleServer.ClientOptions();

Client options parameters have default values listed in this table:

Parameter	default value
tokenEndpoint	"/token"
host	window.location.origin
httpClient	XMLHttpRequestClient

NOTE: You can implement your own HttpClient by implementing our HttpClient abstract class

2. Creat the client providing the options object:

var simpleServerClient =  new JwtSimpleServer.ServerClient(defaultServerOptions);

3. Request an access token by executing requestAccessToken method:

simpleServerClient.requestAccessToken({ userName: "demo", password: "demo" })
	.then(token => {
     // your token object will have the access token and expiral, and if configured: the refresh token
   }):

*Client events

JWT client have several observables you can subscribe to:

Observable	return value	description
onBeforeRequestAccessToken	void	Will notify observers before starting the token request to the server
onRequestAccessTokenSuccess	Token	Will notify observers passing the retrieved token as parameter
onBeforeRequestRefreshToken	void	Will notify observers before starting the refresh token request to the server
onRequestRefreshTokenSuccess	Token	Will notify observers passing the retrieved refresh token as parameter

4. Optional: If you want the library to request new access tokens given an interval you can configure the RefreshTokenService

var refreshService = new JwtSimpleServer.RefreshTokenService(simpleServerClient);

let onTokenRefreshedFunction = (token) => {
   console.log("Refresh token service:", token);
}

//Start the renewal service
refreshService.start({
   intervalSeconds: 10,
   refreshToken,
   onRefreshTokenSuccessCallback: onTokenRefreshedFunction
});

//Stop the renewal service
refreshService.stop();