Grails: Setting URL mapping priorities - spring

I sometimes come across a situation where I'm trying to set URLMappings as such:
/** -> ContentController
/static/$image/$imageNumber -> ResourcesController
Then when I visit /static/image/13 it will often hit the /** instead of the /static/*/* How do I tell Spring / Grails to rather try and match the other one first?

URL mappings are hit in the order they are declared, so put your catch all /** last.
EDIT: This answer tickled at the back of my mind, and I recalled something I read on the mailing list a while back. Back in Grails 1.1 or so, URLMappings were evaluated in the order declared. Now, however, URLMapping matching is slightly more complex. The URLMappings will try to return the best match by comparing the number of wildcards, static tokens, and finally number of constraints. You can see this in the source.
Since URL mapping order no longer matters, it must be something else (although I find listing them in rough order makes it easier to read through them). It looks like the second fragment should actually be a static token. I'd try /static/image/$imageNumber.

Turns out that Grails will go from more specific to least specific, as long as:
You don't have syntax errors in your URLMappings and
Sometimes you need to restart grails for it to correctly take effect.
"/other-test/$testname" { // Fired for "/other-test/hi-there/"
controller="test"
}
"/**" { // fired for "/something-else"
controller="test"
}

Related

Is it safe to pass a Lucene Query String directly from a user into a QueryParser?

tldr: Can I securely pass a raw query string (retrieved as a URL parameter) into a Lucene QueryParser without any added input sanitization?
I'm not a security expert, but I need some advice. As the title states, is it safe to use this controller method:
#CrossOrigin(origins = "${allowed-origin}")
#GetMapping(value = "/search/{query_string}", produces = MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON_VALUE)
public List doSearch(#PathVariable("query_string") String queryString) {
return searchQueryHandlerService.doSearch(queryString);
}
In tandem with this service method (the error handling is for testing only):
public List doSearch(String queryString) {
LOGGER.debug("Parsing query string: " + queryString);
try {
Query q = new QueryParser(null, standardAnalyzer).parse(queryString);
FullTextEntityManager manager = Search.getFullTextEntityManager(entityManager);
FullTextQuery fullTextQuery = manager.createFullTextQuery(q, Poem.class, Book.class, Section.class);
return fullTextQuery.getResultList();
} catch (ParseException e) {
LOGGER.error(e);
return Collections.emptyList();
}
}
With only basic input sanitization? If this isn't safe are there measures I can take to make it safe?
Any help is greatly appreciated.
I've been looking into this on and off for the last few weeks and I cannot find any reason why it wouldn't be safe, but It's such an obscure question (in an area I'm unfamiliar with) that I may be missing some obvious, fundamental problem anyone working in the area would see immediately.
A FullTextQuery is always read only, so you don't have to be concerned with people dropping tables or similar issues that you might have to consider when dealing with SQL injection.
But you might want to be careful if you have security restrictions on what data can be seen by your users.
The API also restricts the operation to a certain set of indexes - in your case those containing the Poem entities - so it's also not possible to break out of the chosen indexes.
But you need to consider:
is it ok if the user is able to somehow find a different Poem than what you expected them to look for
if you share the same index with other entities, there might be some ways to infer data about these other entities
So to be security conscious you might want to:
each entity type gets indexed into its own index (which is the default).
enable some FullTextFilter to restrict the user query based on your custom rules.
actually check the content of each result before rendering it, so to remove content that your other filters didn't catch.
If you are extremely paranoid, consider that any full-text index can actually reveal a bit about how frequent certain terms are in the whole index. People are normally not too concerned about this as it's extremely hard to take advantage of, and only minimal clues about the data distribution are revealed.
So back at your example, if this index just contains poems and you're ok with allowing any user to see any poem you have stored, giving away clues about which poems you are making available is normally not a security concern but is rather the whole point of your service.

graphql- same query with different arguments

Can the below be achieved with graph ql:
we have getusers() / getusers(id=3) / getusers(name='John). Can we use same query to accept different parameters (arguments)?
I assume you mean something like:
type Query {
getusers: [User]!
getusers(id: ID!): User
getusers(name: String!): User
}
IMHO the first thing to do is try. You should get an error saying that Query.getusers can only be defined once, which would answer your question right away.
Here's the actual spec saying that such a thing is not valid: http://facebook.github.io/graphql/June2018/#example-5e409
Quote:
Each named operation definition must be unique within a document when
referred to by its name.
Solution
From what I've seen, the most GraphQL'y way to create such an API is to define a filter input type, something like this:
input UserFilter {
ids: [ID]
names: [String]
}
and then:
type Query {
users(filter: UserFilter)
}
The resolver would check what filters were passed (if any) and query the data accordingly.
This is very simple and yet really powerful as it allows the client to query for an arbitrary number of users using an arbitrary filter. As a back-end developer you may add more options to UserFilter later on, including some pagination options and other cool things, while keeping the old API intact. And, of course, it is up to you how flexible you want this API to be.
But why is it like that?
Warning! I am assuming some things here and there, and might be wrong.
GraphQL is only a logical API layer, which is supposed to be server-agnostic. However, I believe that the original implementation was in JavaScript (citation needed). If you then consider the technical aspects of implementing a GraphQL API in JS, you might get an idea about why it is the way it is.
Each query points to a resolver function. In JS resolvers are simple functions stored inside plain objects at paths specified by the query/mutation/subscription name. As you may know, JS objects can't have more than one path with the same name. This means that you could only define a single resolver for a given query name, thus all three getusers would map to the same function Query.getusers(obj, args, ctx, info) anyway.
So even if GraphQL allowed for fields with the same name, the resolver would have to explicitly check for whatever arguments were passed, i.e. if (args.id) { ... } else if (args.name) { ... }, etc., thus partially defeating the point of having separate endpoints. On the other hand, there is an overall better (particularly from the client's perspective) way to define such an API, as demonstrated above.
Final note
GraphQL is conceptually different from REST, so it doesn't make sense to think in terms of three endpoints (/users, /users/:id and /users/:name), which is what I guess you were doing. A paradigm shift is required in order to unveil the full potential of the language.
a request of the type works:
Query {
first:getusers(),
second:getusers(id=3)
third:getusers(name='John)
}

Should Container be cleared on every search?

I am not very familiar with Solr Search, but the following code which some contractors are doing for us looks very wrong to me:
public ActionResult SearchLiveTraining(string searchText, string locationsID)
{
// irrelevant code...
//clean Container
Startup.Container.Clear();
Startup.InitContainer();
// irrelevant code...
}
The thing that seems very strange to me is that Startup is static class and this seems like the sort of calls that should be made once at the beginning of the application... not once for every search.
I am also concerned about whether even though this works fine in testing, if in production when many people are using the page at a time if this will cause problems?
Are my fears justified and should I immediately look to correct this, or is this actually how solr search is intended to work?

Change url of angular-ui-router without reloading page

I'd like for changes in the URL to drive my application, and for changes in the application to change the URL, but not actually change state.
I have a route like this. The country/city example is a bit contrived, hopefully that doesn't confuse things. The relationship in the real application is somewhat hierarchical. Child views don't seem a fit though because there's no need for nested views.
$stateProvider.state( 'viewMap', {
url: '/viewMap/:country/:city',
templateUrl: 'pages/viewMap/viewMap.html',
controller: 'ViewMapController'
};
In ViewMapController, I can construct the page based on $stateParams.country and .city. As these values change, my application reacts and I want the url to stay in sync. I don't want to reload the whole page, however. I just want to update the url and push a history state on to the stack.
I understand I could manually construct a string:
updateUrl = function() {
window.location.hash = '#/viewMap/'+ $stateParams.country +'/'+ $stateParams.city
}
This feels fragile, as the way I build the string is separate from the way the framework parses it. I would prefer for the framework to build me a string based on the current params, but $state.href('.') describes the current route, which doesn't include $stateParams that haven't yet been activated/navigated to.
I've also looked at reloadOnSearch, but I think it only applies to query params.
Is there a better way to model this? It feels like I'm fighting the framework over something simple.
You can pass state params to $state.href function to get the complete URL
$state.href('.', $stateParams)
To generate arbitrary urls you can pass non-current params and/or configuration:
$state.href('.', {country:'usa',city:'sf'}, {absolute:true})

How to change a single querystring parameter, possibly via a control action?

In the last three days I've struggled trying to find a way to accomplish what I though was supposed to be a simple thing. Doing this on my own or searching for a solution in the web, didn't help. Maybe because I'm not even sure what to look for, when I do my researches.
I'll try to explain as much as I can here: maybe someone will be able to help me.
I won't say how I'm doing it, because I've tried to do it in many ways and none of them worked for different reasons: I prefer to see a fresh advice from you.
In most of the pages of web application, I have two links (but they could be more) like that:
Option A
Option B
This is partial view, retured by a controller action.
User can select or both (all) values, but they can't never select none of them: meaning that at least one must be always selected.
These links must che accessible in almost all pages and they are not supposed to redirect to a different page, but only to store this information somewhere, to be reused when action needs to filter returned contents: a place always accessible, regarding the current controller, action or user (including non authenticated users) (session? cookie?).
This information is used to filter displayed contents in the whole web application.
So, the problem is not how to create the business logi of that, but how (and where) to store this information:
without messing with the querystring (means: keeps the querystring as empty/clean as possible)
without redirecting to other pages (user must get the current page, just with different contents)
allow this information to persists between all views, until user click again to change the option(s)
My aim is to have this information stored in a model that will contains all options and their selection status (on/off), so the appropriates PartialView will know how to display them.
Also, I could send this model to the "thing" that will handle option changes.
Thanks.
UPDATE
Following Paul's advice, I've took the Session way:
private List<OptionSelectionModel> _userOptionPreferences;
protected List<OptionSelectionModel> UserOptionPreferences
{
get
{
if (Session["UserOptionPreferences"] == null)
{
_userOptionPreferences= Lib.Options.GetOptionSelectionModelList();
}
else
{
_userOptionPreferences= Session["UserOptionPreferences"].ToString().Deserialize<List<OptionSelectionModel>>();
}
if (_userOptionPreferences.Where(g => g.Selected).Count() == 0)
{
foreach (var userOptionPreferencesin _userOptionPreferences)
{
userOptionPreferences.Selected = true;
}
}
UserOptionPreferences= _userOptionPreferences;
return _userOptionPreferences;
}
private set
{
_userOptionPreferences= value;
Session["UserOptionPreferences"] = _userOptionPreferences.SerializeObject();
}
}
Following this, I've overridden (not sure is the right conjugation of "to override" :) OnActionExecuting():
protected override void OnActionExecuting(ActionExecutingContext filterContext)
{
GetOptionSelections();
base.OnActionExecuting(filterContext);
}
GetOptionSelections()...
private void GetOptionSelections()
{
if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(Request["optionCode"])) return;
var newOptionCode = Request["optionCode "];
foreach (var userOptionPreferencesin UserOptionPreferences)
{
if (userOptionPreferences.OptionCode == newOptionCode )
userOptionPreferences.Selected = !userOptionPreferences.Selected;
}
}
This code I think can be better, but right now I just want to make it work and it doesn't.
Maybe there are also other issues there (quite sure, actually), but I believe the main issue is that OnActionExecuting is called by each action in a controller that inherit from BaseController, therefore it keeps toggling userOptionPreferences.Selected on/off, but I don't know how to make GetOptionSelections() being called only once in each View: something like the old Page_Load, but for MVC.
Last update AKA solution
Ok, using the session way, I've managed to store this information.
The other issue wasn't really on topic with this question and I've managed to solve it creating a new action that take cares of handling the option's change, then redirects to the caller URL (using the usual returnUrl parameter, but as action parameter).
This way, the option change is done only once per call.
The only thing I don't really like is that I can't simply work with the UserOptionPreferences property, as it doesn't change the session value, but only the value in memory, so I have to set the property with the new object's status each time: not a big deal, but not nice either.
This is a place to use session.
The session will keep your setting between requests while keeping it out of the url querystring. It seems that you have probably tried this already, but try it again and if you have problems ask again. I think it will be the best way for you to solve this problem.

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