[keycloak-dev] Thoughts on Keycloak CLI

[Stian Thorgersen]

----- Original Message -----
> From: "Stan Silvert" <ssilvert at redhat.com>
> To: "Stian Thorgersen" <stian at redhat.com>
> Cc: keycloak-dev at lists.jboss.org
> Sent: Tuesday, 19 May, 2015 2:11:48 PM
> Subject: Re: [keycloak-dev] Thoughts on Keycloak CLI
> 
> On 5/19/2015 2:22 AM, Stian Thorgersen wrote:
> > I'm not a big fan of Design #2, sounds like it's going to be pretty much
> > useless.
> #2 gives you an easy way to execute the REST API from the command line
> or via a CLI script.  Surely, that's a useful feature to have.

So does CURL and I bet it's easier to just use that directly than a DMR wrapped REST API

> > We should do it properly if we/when we do it. DMR/CLI is hard enough to use
> > as it is!
> #1 is prettier.  #2 is more raw.  I don't see why we wouldn't have both
> eventually.  I'm halfway done with #2.  It's easy to implement and
> having it is better than not having it.  Plus, having #2 will make it
> easier to implement #1.
> 
> Are you still thinking we should have our own proprietary CLI instead?

Yes, I'm pretty convinced wrapping the REST endpoint isn't going to produce an usable CLI

> >
> > The first priority for CLI is to have support to reset admin password and
> > to do import/export, not the admin endpoints.
> Is reset admin password not allowed from the REST API?
> > We also need to make sure we can authenticate properly using Keycloak.
> I'm not sure what you mean by this.  Can you elaborate?

Adding operations from admin endpoints (create/update realm, create/update users, etc.) isn't the highest priority. What we do need is:

* Recover admin password - if a user looses the admin password there's no easy way to recover access other than manually editing the database
* Make it easier to run import/export and allow running it offline

As we're using JBoss CLI, which now has an offline mode, that's the perfect place to add those operations.

> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> >> From: "Stan Silvert" <ssilvert at redhat.com>
> >> To: keycloak-dev at lists.jboss.org
> >> Sent: Monday, 18 May, 2015 8:38:40 PM
> >> Subject: Re: [keycloak-dev] Thoughts on Keycloak CLI
> >>
> >> BTW, I've got some down time waiting on Elytron, so I've decided to do a
> >> quickie implementation of #2 to see how it goes.
> >>
> >> On 5/15/2015 8:36 AM, Stan Silvert wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >> I've been giving some thought to the Keycloak integration with WildFly
> >> CLI.
> >> There are two designs. Both involve a subsystem called "kcrest" with a
> >> resource called "server". You can define a server to talk to using these
> >> three attributes:
> >> base-url ( value is something like http://localhost:8080/auth/admin/realms
> >> )
> >> username
> >> password
> >>
> >> username and password are optional. If you don't mind having these values
> >> stored in standalone.xml/domain.xml you can specify them. That way, you
> >> don't have to include them with each request.
> >>
> >> Design #1: Implement all of the Keycloak REST API in CLI
> >> We build out resources for each REST path and put them in the management
> >> model. Then build out operations for everything. So a CLI session to
> >> create
> >> a client called "myclient" might look like this:
> >> cd /subsystem=kcrest/server=foo
> >> cd realm=myrealm
> >> clients=myclient:add(enabled=true)
> >>
> >> Design #2: Create a single generic operation that closely mimics the REST
> >> API
> >> cd /subsystem=kcrest/server=foo
> >> :submit(method=POST,
> >> path=/myrealm/clients,params={"clientId"=>"myclient","enabled"=>"true"})
> >>
> >> Advantages of Design #1
> >>
> >>
> >>      * Looks and behaves just like other CLI resources
> >>      * Uses standard CLI operations
> >>      * Each resource and operation can contain help text
> >>      * Everything can be navigated from CLI command line or CLI GUI tree,
> >>      making it easy to browse the model
> >>
> >>
> >> Disadvantages of Design #1
> >>
> >>
> >>      * It might take a very long time to implement (2-3 months?)
> >>      * Ongoing maintenance. Every time REST API changes, you have to
> >>      update
> >>      subsystem code
> >>
> >>
> >> Advantages of Design #2
> >>
> >>
> >>      * Quick to implement (2-3 weeks)
> >>      * Always works despite REST API changes
> >>
> >>
> >> Disadvantages of Design #2
> >>
> >>
> >>      * :submit operations get long and ugly
> >>      * Can't specify help text for each resource
> >>      * Hard to browse the model. Need to submit "list" style REST
> >>      invocations.
> >>
> >>
> >> Note that it might be possible to auto-generate Design #1. If so, it would
> >> be
> >> the best of both worlds.
> >>
> >>
> >> Whoever implements this should probably start with Design #2 and then
> >> spend
> >> some time researching auto-generation of Design #1.
> >>
> >>
> >> Other thoughts?
> >>
> >>
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> >>
> >>
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> 
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