cordova-plugin-ms-adal

Active Directory Authentication Library (ADAL) plugin for Apache Cordova apps

Active Directory Authentication Library (ADAL) plugin provides easy to use authentication functionality for your Apache Cordova apps by taking advantage of Windows Server Active Directory and Windows Azure Active Directory. Here you can find the source code for the library.

• ADAL for Android,
• ADAL for iOS,
• ADAL for .NET.

This plugin uses native SDKs for ADAL for each supported platform and provides single API across all platforms. Here is a quick usage sample:

// Shows user authentication dialog if required
function authenticate(authCompletedCallback, errorCallback) {
  var authContext = new Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationContext(authority);  
  authContext.tokenCache.readItems().then(function (items) {
    if (items.length > 0) {
        authority = items[0].authority;
        authContext = new Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationContext(authority);
    }
    // Attempt to authorize user silently
    authContext.acquireTokenSilentAsync(resourceUri, clientId)
    .then(authCompletedCallback, function () {
        // We require user cridentials so triggers authentication dialog
        authContext.acquireTokenAsync(resourceUri, clientId, redirectUri)
        .then(authCompletedCallback, errorCallback);
    });
  });
};

authenticate(function(authResponse) {
  console.log("Token acquired: " + authResponse.accessToken);
  console.log("Token will expire on: " + authResponse.expiresOn);
}, function(err) {
  console.log("Failed to authenticate: " + err);
});

For more API documentation and examples see Azure AD Cordova Getting Started and JSDoc for exposed functionality stored in www subfolder.

Supported platforms

• Android (OS 4.0.3 and higher)
• iOS
• Windows (Windows 8.0, Windows 8.1, Windows 10 and Windows Phone 8.1)

Creating new AuthenticationContext

The Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationContext class retrieves authentication tokens from Azure Active Directory and ADFS services. Use AuthenticationContext constructor to synchronously create a new AuthenticationContext object.

Parameters

• authority: Authority url to send code and token requests. (String) [Required]
• validateAuthority: Validate authority before sending token request. (Boolean) (Default: true) [Optional]

Example

var authContext = new Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationContext("https://login.windows.net/common"); 

AuthenticationContext methods and properties

• acquireTokenAsync
• acquireTokenSilentAsync
• tokenCache

acquireTokenAsync

The AuthenticationContext.acquireTokenAsync method asynchronously acquires token using interactive flow. It always shows UI and skips token from cache.

• resourceUrl: Resource identifier. (String) [Required]
• clientId: Client (application) identifier. (String) [Required]
• redirectUrl: Redirect url for this application. (String) [Required]
• userId: User identifier. (String) [Optional]
• extraQueryParameters: Extra query parameters. Parameters should be escaped before passing to this method (e.g. using 'encodeURI()') (String) [Optional]

Note: Those with experience in using native ADAL libraries should pay attention as the plugin uses PromptBehaviour.Always when calling AcquireToken method and native libraries use PromptBehaviour.Auto by default. As a result the plugin does not check the cache for existing access or refresh token. This is special design decision so that AcquireToken is always showing a UX and AcquireTokenSilent never does so.

Example

var authContext = new Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationContext("https://login.windows.net/common");
authContext.acquireTokenAsync("https://graph.windows.net", "a5d92493-ae5a-4a9f-bcbf-9f1d354067d3", "http://MyDirectorySearcherApp")
  .then(function(authResponse) {
    console.log("Token acquired: " + authResponse.accessToken);
    console.log("Token will expire on: " + authResponse.expiresOn);
  }, function(err) {
    console.log("Failed to authenticate: " + err);
  });

acquireTokenSilentAsync

The AuthenticationContext.acquireTokenSilentAsync method acquires token WITHOUT using interactive flow. It checks the cache to return existing result if not expired. It tries to use refresh token if available. If it fails to get token withoutd isplaying UI it will fail. This method guarantees that no UI will be shown to user.

• resourceUrl: Resource identifier. (String) [Required]
• clientId: Client (application) identifier. (String) [Required]
• userId: User identifier. (String) [Optional]

Example

var authContext = new Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationContext("https://login.windows.net/common");
authContext.acquireTokenSilentAsync("https://graph.windows.net", "a5d92493-ae5a-4a9f-bcbf-9f1d354067d3")
  .then(function(authResponse) {
    console.log("Token acquired: " + authResponse.accessToken);
    console.log("Token will expire on: " + authResponse.expiresOn);
  }, function(err) {
    console.log("Failed to authenticate: " + err);
  });

tokenCache

The AuthenticationContext.tokenCache property returns TokenCache class instance which stores access and refresh tokens. This class could be used to retrieve cached items (readItems method), remove specific (deleteItem method) or all items (clear method).

Example

var authContext = new Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationContext("https://login.windows.net/common");
authContext.tokenCache.readItems().then(function (items) {
  console.log("Num cached items: " + items.length);
});

Known issues and workarounds

How to sign out

Similar to native labraries the plugin does not provide special method to sign out as it depends on server/application logic. The recomendation here is

1. Step1: clear cache

   var authContext = new Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationContext("https://login.windows.net/common"); authContext.tokenCache.clear();

2. Step2: make XmlHttpRequest (or open InAppBrowser instance) pointing to the sign out url. In most cases the url should look like the following: https://login.windows.net/{tenantid or "common"}/oauth2/logout?post_logout_redirect_uri={URL}

'Class not registered' error on Windows

If you are using Visual Studio 2013 and see 'WinRTError: Class not registered' runtime error on Windows make sure Visual Studio Update 5 is installed.

Multiple login windows issue

Multiple login dialog windows will be shown if acquireTokenAsync is called multiple times and the token could not be acquired silently (at the first run for example). Use a promise queueing/semaphore logic in the app code to avoid this issue.

Installation Instructions

Prerequisites

• NodeJS and NPM

• Cordova CLI

  Cordova CLI can be easily installed via NPM package manager: npm install -g cordova

• Additional prerequisites for each target platform can be found at Cordova platforms documentation page:

• Instructions for Android

• Instructions for iOS

• [Instructions for Windows] (http://cordova.apache.org/docs/en/edge/guide_platforms_win8_index.md.html#Windows%20Platform%20Guide)

To build and run sample application

• Clone plugin repository into a directory of your choice

  git clone https://github.com/AzureAD/azure-activedirectory-library-for-cordova.git

• Create a project and add the platforms you want to support

  cordova create ADALSample --copy-from="azure-activedirectory-library-for-cordova/sample"

  cd ADALSample

  cordova platform add android

  cordova platform add ios

  cordova platform add windows

• Add the plugin to your project

  cordova plugin add ../azure-activedirectory-library-for-cordova

• Build and run application: cordova run.

Setting up an Application in Azure AD

You can find detailed instructions how to set up a new application in Azure AD here.

Tests

This plugin contains test suite, based on Cordova test-framework plugin. The test suite is placed under tests folder at the root or repo and represents a separate plugin.

To run the tests you need to create a new application as described in Installation Instructions section and then do the following steps:

• Add test suite to application

  cordova plugin add ../azure-activedirectory-library-for-cordova/tests

• Update application's config.xml file: change <content src="index.html" /> to <content src="cdvtests/index.html" />

• Change AD-specific settings for test application at the beginning of plugins\cordova-plugin-ms-adal\www\tests.js file. Update AUTHORITY_URL, RESOURCE_URL, REDIRECT_URL, APP_ID to values, provided by your Azure AD. For instructions how to setup an Azure AD application see Setting up an Application in Azure AD section.

• Build and run application.

Windows Quirks

There is currently a Cordova issue, which entails the need of the hook-based workaround. The workaround is to be discarded after a fix is applied.

Using ADFS/SSO

To use ADFS/SSO on Windows platform (Windows Phone 8.1 is not supported for now) add the following preference into config.xml: <preference name="adal-use-corporate-network" value="true" />

adal-use-corporate-network is false by default.

It will add all needed application capabilities and toggle authContext to support ADFS. You can change its value to false and back later, or remove it from config.xml - call cordova prepare after it to apply the changes.

Note: You should not normally use adal-use-corporate-network as it adds capabilities, which prevents an app from being published in the Windows Store.

Android Quirks

Broker support

The following method should be used to enable broker component support (delivered with Intune's Company portal app). Read ADAL for Android to understand broker concept in more details.

Microsoft.ADAL.AuthenticationSettings.setUseBroker(true);

Note: Developer needs to register special redirectUri for broker usage. RedirectUri is in the format of msauth://packagename/Base64UrlencodedSignature

Copyrights

Copyright (c) Microsoft Open Technologies, Inc. All rights reserved.

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use these files except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.