I'm quite frustrated about the fact that an authentication scheme appears to be mandatory in Asp.Net Core.
My objective is to build an API and I don't want to know anything about the client. I've built custom authentication and authorization, which works fine. I'm not using identity or cookies. However, I can't return a 403 Forbid result without a valid authentication scheme, otherwise I get the following exception...
System.InvalidOperationException: No authentication handler is
configured to handle the scheme: Automatic
My question is, can I configure MVC to not use an authentication scheme or create an authentication scheme without the reliance on a login path or any path for that matter?
After poring over the Asp.net Core security source code, I've managed to create a custom authentication handler. To do this you need to implement 3 classes.
The first class implements an abstract AuthenticationOptions.
public class AwesomeAuthenticationOptions : AuthenticationOptions {
public AwesomeAuthenticationOptions() {
AuthenticationScheme = "AwesomeAuthentication";
AutomaticAuthenticate = false;
}
}
The second class implements an abstract AuthenticationHandler.
public class AwesomeAuthentication : AuthenticationHandler<AwesomeAuthenticationOptions>
{
protected override async Task<AuthenticateResult> HandleAuthenticateAsync()
{
var prop = new AuthenticationProperties();
var ticket = new AuthenticationTicket(Context.User, prop, "AwesomeAuthentication");
//this is where you setup the ClaimsPrincipal
//if auth fails, return AuthenticateResult.Fail("reason for failure");
return await Task.Run(() => AuthenticateResult.Success(ticket));
}
}
The third class implements an abstract AuthenticationMiddleware.
public class AwesomeAuthenticationMiddleware : AuthenticationMiddleware<AwesomeAuthenticationOptions>
{
public AwesomeAuthenticationMiddleware(RequestDelegate next,
IOptions<AwesomeAuthenticationOptions> options,
ILoggerFactory loggerFactory,
UrlEncoder urlEncoder) : base(next, options, loggerFactory, urlEncoder) {
}
protected override AuthenticationHandler<AwesomeAuthenticationOptions> CreateHandler()
{
return new AwesomeAuthentication();
}
}
Finally, you use the middleware component in the Startup.cs Configure method.
app.UseMiddleware<AwesomeAuthenticationMiddleware>();
Now you can build your own Authentication Schemes.