Using the KeystoreManager for CORBA SSL support
I'm looking at implementing KeystoreManager support in the openejb CORBA
TLS layer (see Jira GERONIMO-2002), and I'm having trouble deciding how
best to do this. The KeystoreManager GBean merely manages access to the
keystores and the creating of SSLSocket factories for creating
connections (and currently, it only supports SSLServerSockets, but it's
a fairly trivial matter to add SSLSocketFactory support too). In order
to use the KeystoreManager to create a socket, the caller must provide a
number of additional pieces of information, such as the truststore and
keystore names, and the key alias. For example, here's the
configuration for the HTTPSConnector used to configure Jetty:
gbean name=JettySSLConnector
class=org.apache.geronimo.jetty.connector.HTTPSConnector
attribute name=host${PlanServerHostname}/attribute
attribute name=port${PlanHTTPSPort}/attribute
attribute name=keyStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=keyAliasgeronimo/attribute
attribute name=trustStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=clientAuthRequiredfalse/attribute
attribute name=algorithmDefault/attribute
attribute name=secureProtocolTLS/attribute
attribute name=maxThreads150/attribute
attribute name=minThreads25/attribute
reference name=JettyContainer
nameJettyWebContainer/name
/reference
reference name=KeystoreManager
nameKeystoreManager/name
/reference
/gbean
In this case, the keyStore, keyAlias, trustStore, algorithm,
secureProtocol, and KeystoreManager values are all needed to create the
SSLServerSocketFactory instance that will be used to create the SSL
connection.
Now, to enable this support for CORBA, the two beans that create the ORB
instances (CORBABean and CSSBean) will need the same set of attributes
(and those attributes will need to be propagated to a couple of other
objects, which would start to get pretty messy). Alternatively, it
might make sense to have an SSLFactoryGBean, which is configured with
all of the attributes above, and which has methods for creating an
SSLSocket and a SSLServerSocket, and/or retrieving an appropriately
configured socket factory. This seems to me like a simpler
implementation, allowing the two CORBA beans to just be initialized with
the SSLFactoryGBean instance. It might make sense to rework the
HTTPSConnector too to use the same pattern.
So, which model should be used here:
1) Current model employed with HTTPSConnector where all KeystoreManager
users expose/manage all of the attributes necessary to create SSL
connections using the KeystoreManager, or
2) Have an SSLFactory GBean where the SSL characteristics are
configured separately from the SSL consumer?
Rick
Re: Using the KeystoreManager for CORBA SSL support
You can't have a single GBean hold all that information and make it
the same for every SSL client/server. For example, the client needs
no keystore if it's not using client auth, and needs a separate
keystore if it is. The protocol and algorithm can probably be
configured at the JVM level -- I'm not sure about the rest. It's
plausible that you might want two different SSL connectors with
different key/trust/client auth settings, one for internal clients and
one for external clients.
Thanks,
Aaron
On 5/12/06, Rick McGuire [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I'm looking at implementing KeystoreManager support in the openejb CORBA
TLS layer (see Jira GERONIMO-2002), and I'm having trouble deciding how
best to do this. The KeystoreManager GBean merely manages access to the
keystores and the creating of SSLSocket factories for creating
connections (and currently, it only supports SSLServerSockets, but it's
a fairly trivial matter to add SSLSocketFactory support too). In order
to use the KeystoreManager to create a socket, the caller must provide a
number of additional pieces of information, such as the truststore and
keystore names, and the key alias. For example, here's the
configuration for the HTTPSConnector used to configure Jetty:
gbean name=JettySSLConnector
class=org.apache.geronimo.jetty.connector.HTTPSConnector
attribute name=host${PlanServerHostname}/attribute
attribute name=port${PlanHTTPSPort}/attribute
attribute name=keyStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=keyAliasgeronimo/attribute
attribute name=trustStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=clientAuthRequiredfalse/attribute
attribute name=algorithmDefault/attribute
attribute name=secureProtocolTLS/attribute
attribute name=maxThreads150/attribute
attribute name=minThreads25/attribute
reference name=JettyContainer
nameJettyWebContainer/name
/reference
reference name=KeystoreManager
nameKeystoreManager/name
/reference
/gbean
In this case, the keyStore, keyAlias, trustStore, algorithm,
secureProtocol, and KeystoreManager values are all needed to create the
SSLServerSocketFactory instance that will be used to create the SSL
connection.
Now, to enable this support for CORBA, the two beans that create the ORB
instances (CORBABean and CSSBean) will need the same set of attributes
(and those attributes will need to be propagated to a couple of other
objects, which would start to get pretty messy). Alternatively, it
might make sense to have an SSLFactoryGBean, which is configured with
all of the attributes above, and which has methods for creating an
SSLSocket and a SSLServerSocket, and/or retrieving an appropriately
configured socket factory. This seems to me like a simpler
implementation, allowing the two CORBA beans to just be initialized with
the SSLFactoryGBean instance. It might make sense to rework the
HTTPSConnector too to use the same pattern.
So, which model should be used here:
1) Current model employed with HTTPSConnector where all KeystoreManager
users expose/manage all of the attributes necessary to create SSL
connections using the KeystoreManager, or
2) Have an SSLFactory GBean where the SSL characteristics are
configured separately from the SSL consumer?
Rick
Re: Using the KeystoreManager for CORBA SSL support
OK... I guess I'm just having trouble seeing what this would look
like. Can you show what the SSL configuration would look like for the
new GBean and the same Jetty SSL server if you use the scheme you're
proposing? (Or a CORBA component, if you're suggesting something that
would be applicable to CORBA only.)
Thanks,
Aaron
On 5/12/06, Rick McGuire [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I wasn't proposing having a single GBean instance to hold all of the
information, but a common GBean class that is used to configure things
and centralize the information/use of the information. For example, the
CSSBean and CORBABean classes use a common config adaptor that
encapsulates a number of the ORB implementation specifics from the
instantiating code. This config adapator will need the SSL connector to
set up the ORB socket factory. This task becomes a lot simpler if there
is a single class that carries the information and can be used to
retrieve the appropriate socket factories. These classes can even
encapsulate the default fallback logic for when there is no explicit
store configured.
For example, the client needs
no keystore if it's not using client auth, and needs a separate
keystore if it is. The protocol and algorithm can probably be
configured at the JVM level -- I'm not sure about the rest. It's
plausible that you might want two different SSL connectors with
different key/trust/client auth settings, one for internal clients and
one for external clients.
Thanks,
Aaron
On 5/12/06, Rick McGuire [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I'm looking at implementing KeystoreManager support in the openejb CORBA
TLS layer (see Jira GERONIMO-2002), and I'm having trouble deciding how
best to do this. The KeystoreManager GBean merely manages access to the
keystores and the creating of SSLSocket factories for creating
connections (and currently, it only supports SSLServerSockets, but it's
a fairly trivial matter to add SSLSocketFactory support too). In order
to use the KeystoreManager to create a socket, the caller must provide a
number of additional pieces of information, such as the truststore and
keystore names, and the key alias. For example, here's the
configuration for the HTTPSConnector used to configure Jetty:
gbean name=JettySSLConnector
class=org.apache.geronimo.jetty.connector.HTTPSConnector
attribute name=host${PlanServerHostname}/attribute
attribute name=port${PlanHTTPSPort}/attribute
attribute name=keyStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=keyAliasgeronimo/attribute
attribute name=trustStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=clientAuthRequiredfalse/attribute
attribute name=algorithmDefault/attribute
attribute name=secureProtocolTLS/attribute
attribute name=maxThreads150/attribute
attribute name=minThreads25/attribute
reference name=JettyContainer
nameJettyWebContainer/name
/reference
reference name=KeystoreManager
nameKeystoreManager/name
/reference
/gbean
In this case, the keyStore, keyAlias, trustStore, algorithm,
secureProtocol, and KeystoreManager values are all needed to create the
SSLServerSocketFactory instance that will be used to create the SSL
connection.
Now, to enable this support for CORBA, the two beans that create the ORB
instances (CORBABean and CSSBean) will need the same set of attributes
(and those attributes will need to be propagated to a couple of other
objects, which would start to get pretty messy). Alternatively, it
might make sense to have an SSLFactoryGBean, which is configured with
all of the attributes above, and which has methods for creating an
SSLSocket and a SSLServerSocket, and/or retrieving an appropriately
configured socket factory. This seems to me like a simpler
implementation, allowing the two CORBA beans to just be initialized with
the SSLFactoryGBean instance. It might make sense to rework the
HTTPSConnector too to use the same pattern.
So, which model should be used here:
1) Current model employed with HTTPSConnector where all KeystoreManager
users expose/manage all of the attributes necessary to create SSL
connections using the KeystoreManager, or
2) Have an SSLFactory GBean where the SSL characteristics are
configured separately from the SSL consumer?
Rick
Re: Using the KeystoreManager for CORBA SSL support
Well, I don't like it much for Jetty, since it seems to just split off
pertinent settings into another bean. If you're sure that CORBA will
have many objects with exactly the same settings, that's fine with me.
I'd have thought you would just set up one TSS and one CSS (which
would need different SSL factories even in your proposal) and point
all your CORBA users to one of those, but I haven't used CORBA in J2EE
in practice, so I'll defer to others on whether they're likely to have
a lot of overlap or not.
Thanks,
Aaron
On 5/12/06, Rick McGuire [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Aaron Mulder wrote:
OK... I guess I'm just having trouble seeing what this would look
like. Can you show what the SSL configuration would look like for the
new GBean and the same Jetty SSL server if you use the scheme you're
proposing? (Or a CORBA component, if you're suggesting something that
would be applicable to CORBA only.)
Ok, here's the currently Jetty config entry:
gbean name=JettySSLConnector
class=org.apache.geronimo.jetty.connector.HTTPSConnector
attribute name=host${PlanServerHostname}/attribute
attribute name=port${PlanHTTPSPort}/attribute
attribute name=keyStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=keyAliasgeronimo/attribute
attribute name=trustStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=clientAuthRequiredfalse/attribute
attribute name=algorithmDefault/attribute
attribute name=secureProtocolTLS/attribute
attribute name=maxThreads150/attribute
attribute name=minThreads25/attribute
reference name=JettyContainer
nameJettyWebContainer/name
/reference
reference name=KeystoreManager
nameKeystoreManager/name
/reference
/gbean
My proposed new structure:
gbean name=JettySSLFactory
class=org.apache.geronimo.security.SSLFactoryGBean
attribute name=keyStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=keyAliasgeronimo/attribute
attribute name=trustStoregeronimo-default/attribute
attribute name=algorithmDefault/attribute
attribute name=protocolTLS/attribute
reference name=KeystoreManager
nameKeystoreManager/name
/reference
/gbean
gbean name=JettySSLConnector
class=org.apache.geronimo.jetty.connector.HTTPSConnector
attribute name=host${PlanServerHostname}/attribute
attribute name=port${PlanHTTPSPort}/attribute
attribute name=clientAuthRequiredfalse/attribute
reference name=JettyContainer
nameJettyWebContainer/name
/reference
reference name=JettySSLFactory
nameJettySSLFactory/name
/reference
/gbean
This is probably less of an issue for the Jetty config, but it is very
likely that the various CORBA beans will share a common configuration,
so it makes sense to specify that part of the configuration in just one
place and reference it in multiple places.
The SSLFactoryGBean will also implement an interface for retrieving the
socket factories, again to centralize the common logic involved.
Rick
Thanks,
Aaron
On 5/12/06, Rick McGuire [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I wasn't proposing having a single GBean instance to hold all of the
information, but a common GBean class that is used to configure things
and centralize the information/use of the information. For example, the
CSSBean and CORBABean classes use a common config adaptor that
encapsulates a number of the ORB implementation specifics from the
instantiating code. This config adapator will need the SSL connector to
set up the ORB socket factory. This task becomes a lot simpler if there
is a single class that carries the information and can be used to
retrieve the appropriate socket factories. These classes can even
encapsulate the default fallback logic for when there is no explicit
store configured.
For example, the client needs
no keystore if it's not using client auth, and needs a separate
keystore if it is. The protocol and algorithm can probably be
configured at the JVM level -- I'm not sure about the rest. It's
plausible that you might want two different SSL connectors with
different key/trust/client auth settings, one for internal clients and
one for external clients.
Thanks,
Aaron
On 5/12/06, Rick McGuire [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I'm looking at implementing KeystoreManager support in the openejb
CORBA
TLS layer (see Jira GERONIMO-2002), and I'm having trouble
deciding how
best to do this. The KeystoreManager GBean merely manages access
to the
keystores and the creating of SSLSocket factories for creating
connections (and currently, it only supports SSLServerSockets, but
it's
a fairly trivial matter to add SSLSocketFactory support too). In
order
to use the KeystoreManager to create a socket, the caller must
provide a
number of additional pieces of information, such as the truststore
