Configure OpenID Connect with the authorization code flow
Using the OpenID Connect plugin, set up the auth code flow to connect to an identity provider (IdP) through a browser, and use session authentication to store open sessions. You can do this by specifying authorization_code
and session
in the config.auth_methods
plugin settings.
Prerequisites
Kong Konnect
This is a Konnect tutorial and requires a Konnect personal access token.
-
Create a new personal access token by opening the Konnect PAT page and selecting Generate Token.
-
Export your token to an environment variable:
export KONNECT_TOKEN='YOUR_KONNECT_PAT'
-
Run the quickstart script to automatically provision a Control Plane and Data Plane, and configure your environment:
curl -Ls https://get.konghq.com/quickstart | bash -s -- -k $KONNECT_TOKEN --deck-output
This sets up a Konnect Control Plane named
quickstart
, provisions a local Data Plane, and prints out the following environment variable exports:export DECK_KONNECT_TOKEN=$KONNECT_TOKEN export DECK_KONNECT_CONTROL_PLANE_NAME=quickstart export KONNECT_CONTROL_PLANE_URL=https://us.api.konghq.com export KONNECT_PROXY_URL='http://localhost:8000'
Copy and paste these into your terminal to configure your session.
Kong Gateway running
This tutorial requires Kong Gateway Enterprise. If you don’t have Kong Gateway set up yet, you can use the quickstart script with an enterprise license to get an instance of Kong Gateway running almost instantly.
-
Export your license to an environment variable:
export KONG_LICENSE_DATA='LICENSE-CONTENTS-GO-HERE'
-
Run the quickstart script:
curl -Ls https://get.konghq.com/quickstart | bash -s -- -e KONG_LICENSE_DATA
Once Kong Gateway is ready, you will see the following message:
Kong Gateway Ready
decK
decK is a CLI tool for managing Kong Gateway declaratively with state files. To complete this tutorial you will first need to install decK.
Required entities
For this tutorial, you’ll need Kong Gateway entities, like Gateway Services and Routes, pre-configured. These entities are essential for Kong Gateway to function but installing them isn’t the focus of this guide. Follow these steps to pre-configure them:
-
Run the following command:
echo ' _format_version: "3.0" services: - name: example-service url: http://httpbin.konghq.com/anything routes: - name: example-route paths: - "/anything" service: name: example-service ' | deck gateway apply -
To learn more about entities, you can read our entities documentation.
Set up Keycloak
This tutorial requires an identity provider (IdP). If you don’t have one, you can use Keycloak. The steps will be similar in other standard identity providers.
Create a client
-
Install Keycloak (version 26 or later) on your platform.
For example, you can use the Keycloak Docker image:
docker run -p 8080:8080 \ -e KC_BOOTSTRAP_ADMIN_USERNAME=admin \ -e KC_BOOTSTRAP_ADMIN_PASSWORD=admin \ quay.io/keycloak/keycloak start-dev
-
Open the admin console.
The default URL of the console is
http://$YOUR_KEYCLOAK_HOST:8080/admin/master/console/
. - In the sidebar, open Clients, then click Create client.
- Configure the client:
Section |
Settings |
---|---|
General settings |
|
Capability config |
|
Login settings |
Valid redirect URIs: http://localhost:8000/*
|
Set up keys and credentials
- In your client, open the Credentials tab.
- Set Client Authenticator to Client ID and Secret.
- Copy the Client Secret.
- Switch to the Users menu and add a user.
- Open the user’s Credentials tab and add a password. Be sure to disable Temporary Password.
In this guide, we’re going to use an example user named alex
with the password doe
.
Export to environment variables
Export your client secret, client ID, and issuer URL to environment variables so that you can pass them more securely. For example:
export DECK_ISSUER=http://host.docker.internal:8080/realms/master
export DECK_CLIENT_ID=kong
export DECK_CLIENT_SECRET=UNT3GPzCKI7zUbhAmFSUGbj4wmiBDGiW
Enable the OpenID Connect plugin with the auth code flow
Using the Keycloak and Kong Gateway configuration from the prerequisites, set up an instance of the OpenID Connect plugin with the auth code flow and session authentication.
Enable the OpenID Connect plugin on the example-service
Service:
echo '
_format_version: "3.0"
plugins:
- name: openid-connect
service: example-service
config:
issuer: "${{ env "DECK_ISSUER" }}"
client_id:
- "${{ env "DECK_CLIENT_ID" }}"
client_secret:
- "${{ env "DECK_CLIENT_SECRET" }}"
client_auth:
- client_secret_post
auth_methods:
- authorization_code
- session
response_mode: form_post
preserve_query_args: true
login_action: redirect
login_tokens:
authorization_endpoint: http://localhost:8080
' | deck gateway apply -
In this example:
-
issuer
,client ID
,client secret
, andclient auth
: Settings that connect the plugin to your IdP (in this case, the sample Keycloak app). -
auth_methods
: Specifies that the plugin should use session auth and the authorization code flow. -
response_mode
: Set toform_post
so that authorization codes won’t get logged to access logs. -
preserve_query_args
: Preserves the original request query arguments through the authorization code flow redirection. -
login_action
: Redirects the client to the original request URL after the authorization code flow. This turns the POST request into a GET request, and the browser address bar is updated with the original request query arguments. -
login_tokens
: Configures the plugin so that tokens aren’t included in the browser address bar. -
authorization_endpoint
: Sets a custom endpoint for authorization, overriding the endpoint returned by discovery through the IdP. We need this setting because we’re running the example through Docker, otherwise the discovery endpoint will try to access an internal Docker host.
Validate authorization code login
Access the Route you configured in the prerequisites with some query arguments. In a new browser tab, navigate to the following:
http://localhost:8000/anything?hello=world
The browser should be redirected to the Keycloak login page.
Let’s check what happens if you access the same URL using cURL:
curl -i -X GET "$KONNECT_PROXY_URL/anything?hello=world"
curl -i -X GET "http://localhost:8000/anything?hello=world"
You should see a 302
response with the session access token in the response, and a Location
header that shows where the request is being redirected to.
Cleanup
Clean up Konnect environment
If you created a new control plane and want to conserve your free trial credits or avoid unnecessary charges, delete the new control plane used in this tutorial.
Destroy the Kong Gateway container
curl -Ls https://get.konghq.com/quickstart | bash -s -- -d