Membership in ASP.Net...if only

Presented by:Patrick Hynds President, CriticalSitesMicrosoft Regional Director

Agenda• Membership • Provider Model• Custom Providers

– SOA based membership example– Making a custom provider do what the

standard ones won’t (Demo)

• Membership API• Included Membership providers

– SQL Server (and SQL Express)– Active Directory (Windows)– Access (kind of…)

• Installs as a Visual Studio 2005 VSI template

• Custom Membership providers– Oracle– MySQL– SQLLite3– Others + whatever you write yourself…

Membership Service

Membership Service• Service for managing users and credentials

– Declarative access via Web Site Admin Tool– Programmatic access via Membership and

MembershipUser classes• Membership class provides base services• MembershipUser class represents users

and provides additional services• Provider-based for flexible data storage

Membership Service (cont.)• Vastly simplifies forms authentication

– Provides logic for validating user names and passwords, creating accounts, and more

– Provides data store for storing credentials, e-mail addresses, and other membership data

Membership Schema

Membership API

MembershipData

SQL Server OtherData Stores

Membership Providers

ActiveDirectory

Login LoginStatus LoginView Other

Controls

Membership MembershipUser

SqlMembershipProvider

ActiveDirectory-MembershipProvider

Other Providers

LoginView<asp:LoginView ID="LoginView1" Runat="server"> <AnonymousTemplate> <!-- Content seen by unauthenticated users --> </AnonymousTemplate> <LoggedInTemplate> <!-- Content seen by authenticated users --> </LoggedInTemplate> <RoleGroups> <asp:RoleGroup Roles="Administrators"> <ContentTemplate> <!-- Content seen by administrators --> </ContentTemplate> </asp:RoleGroup> ... </RoleGroups></asp:LoginView>

The Membership Class

• Provides static methods for performing key membership tasks– Creating and deleting users– Retrieving information about users– Generating random passwords– Validating logins

• Also includes read-only static properties for acquiring data about provider settings

The MembershipUser Class

• Represents individual users registered in the membership data store

• Includes numerous properties for getting and setting user info

• Includes methods for retrieving, changing, and resetting passwords

• Returned by Membership methods such as GetUser and CreateUser

Configuring the SQL Membership Provider

Provider Model• Enable new functionality in a transparent fashion• Enable extensibility for

– Web services– Browser based “Atlas” clients– Smart clients

• Application services as pluggable building blocks• Decoupled via configuration• Use structural classes for your own features

Provider ModelFeature Lifecycle

Feature Feature config.config.

Static Static feature feature classclass

Provider Provider instanceinstance

ss

Provider Configuration

• Membership providers support a number of configuration settings– How should passwords be stored (cleartext,

hashed, encrypted)?– Should password recovery be enabled?– Must each user have a unique e-mail address?

• Exposed as properties of provider class• Initialized from CONFIG files

public class QuotationsConfiguration : public class QuotationsConfiguration : ConfigurationSectionConfigurationSection{{ [ConfigurationProperty("providers")][ConfigurationProperty("providers")] public ProviderSettingsCollection Providerspublic ProviderSettingsCollection Providers {{ get;get; }}

[ConfigurationProperty("defaultProvider", [ConfigurationProperty("defaultProvider", DefaultValue = "StaticQuotationProvider")]DefaultValue = "StaticQuotationProvider")] public string DefaultProviderpublic string DefaultProvider {{ get;get; set;set; }}}}

Provider ModelFeature Configuration

When to Build a Provider• Physical 3-tier deployments

– May not allow web server to connect directly to SQL Server• Schema isn’t working for you• Your data isn’t in a supported format or repository• You need that killer feature that isn’t provided by

existing providers

Projecting MembershipDesign Issues

• Authenticating to the web service– Not all methods should be public

• Serialization of MembershipUser– Read-only properties don’t serialize

• WebMethod parameter constraints– Collection types and [out] parameters

• Selecting from multiple providers– Choosing a non-default provider

Projecting Membership3-Tier Flow

Web serverWeb server

Webservice Webservice providerprovider

Webservice serverWebservice server

.asmx .asmx MembershiMembership wrapperp wrapper

SQL SQL providerprovider

Application Application codecode

Projecting MembershipAuthenticated Flow

Internet Internet clientclient

ApplicatiApplicationon

Webservice serverWebservice server

.asmx .asmx MembershiMembership wrapperp wrapper

SQL SQL providerprovider

.asmx .asmx Formsuth Formsuth wrapperwrapper

““login”login”

Returns forms Returns forms ticketticket

pass ticket w/

pass ticket w/ each request

each requestValidateValidate

ticket and ticket and rolesroles

Creating a Custom Membership Provider

Summary • Rewrite or enhance features• Project current features onto other platforms

via web services or other methods• Use the provider infrastructure for your own

features• Don’t screw it up, you can always make life

worse – especially in security

ResourcesCustom Membership Providers• Oracle Provider

– Supports Membership, Roles and Personalization – Included in the PetShop sample– http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?

url=/library/en-us/dnbda/html/bdasamppet4.asp• Access Database Provider

– Supports Membership, Roles and Personalization– Installs as a Visual Studio 2005 VSI template– http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/eula.aspx?

id=96713a8e-b8d4-4d6e-bb8f-027e6c8e15d8

ResourcesCustom Membership Providers (cont.)• MySQL Provider

– Support for ASP.NET Membership and Roles– http://www.codeproject.com/aspnet/

MySQLMembershipProvider.asp• SQLLite3

– Supports Membership and Roles– http://www.eggheadcafe.com/articles/

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