Class ProviderManager

java.lang.Object
org.springframework.security.authentication.ProviderManager
All Implemented Interfaces:
org.springframework.beans.factory.Aware, org.springframework.beans.factory.InitializingBean, org.springframework.context.MessageSourceAware, AuthenticationManager

public class ProviderManager extends Object implements AuthenticationManager, org.springframework.context.MessageSourceAware, org.springframework.beans.factory.InitializingBean
Iterates an Authentication request through a list of AuthenticationProviders.

AuthenticationProviders are usually tried in order until one provides a non-null response. A non-null response indicates the provider had authority to decide on the authentication request and no further providers are tried. If a subsequent provider successfully authenticates the request, the earlier authentication exception is disregarded and the successful authentication will be used. If no subsequent provider provides a non-null response, or a new AuthenticationException, the last AuthenticationException received will be used. If no provider returns a non-null response, or indicates it can even process an Authentication, the ProviderManager will throw a ProviderNotFoundException. A parent AuthenticationManager can also be set, and this will also be tried if none of the configured providers can perform the authentication. This is intended to support namespace configuration options though and is not a feature that should normally be required.

The exception to this process is when a provider throws an AccountStatusException, in which case no further providers in the list will be queried. Post-authentication, the credentials will be cleared from the returned Authentication object, if it implements the CredentialsContainer interface. This behaviour can be controlled by modifying the eraseCredentialsAfterAuthentication property.

Event Publishing

Authentication event publishing is delegated to the configured AuthenticationEventPublisher which defaults to a null implementation which doesn't publish events, so if you are configuring the bean yourself you must inject a publisher bean if you want to receive events. The standard implementation is DefaultAuthenticationEventPublisher which maps common exceptions to events (in the case of authentication failure) and publishes an AuthenticationSuccessEvent if authentication succeeds. If you are using the namespace then an instance of this bean will be used automatically by the <http> configuration, so you will receive events from the web part of your application automatically.

Note that the implementation also publishes authentication failure events when it obtains an authentication result (or an exception) from the "parent" AuthenticationManager if one has been set. So in this situation, the parent should not generally be configured to publish events or there will be duplicates.

See Also:
  • Field Details

    • messages

      protected org.springframework.context.support.MessageSourceAccessor messages
  • Constructor Details

  • Method Details

    • afterPropertiesSet

      public void afterPropertiesSet()
      Specified by:
      afterPropertiesSet in interface org.springframework.beans.factory.InitializingBean
    • authenticate

      public Authentication authenticate(Authentication authentication) throws AuthenticationException
      Attempts to authenticate the passed Authentication object.

      The list of AuthenticationProviders will be successively tried until an AuthenticationProvider indicates it is capable of authenticating the type of Authentication object passed. Authentication will then be attempted with that AuthenticationProvider.

      If more than one AuthenticationProvider supports the passed Authentication object, the first one able to successfully authenticate the Authentication object determines the result, overriding any possible AuthenticationException thrown by earlier supporting AuthenticationProviders. On successful authentication, no subsequent AuthenticationProviders will be tried. If authentication was not successful by any supporting AuthenticationProvider the last thrown AuthenticationException will be rethrown.

      Specified by:
      authenticate in interface AuthenticationManager
      Parameters:
      authentication - the authentication request object.
      Returns:
      a fully authenticated object including credentials.
      Throws:
      AuthenticationException - if authentication fails.
    • getProviders

      public List<AuthenticationProvider> getProviders()
    • setMessageSource

      public void setMessageSource(org.springframework.context.MessageSource messageSource)
      Specified by:
      setMessageSource in interface org.springframework.context.MessageSourceAware
    • setAuthenticationEventPublisher

      public void setAuthenticationEventPublisher(AuthenticationEventPublisher eventPublisher)
    • setEraseCredentialsAfterAuthentication

      public void setEraseCredentialsAfterAuthentication(boolean eraseSecretData)
      If set to, a resulting Authentication which implements the CredentialsContainer interface will have its eraseCredentials method called before it is returned from the authenticate() method.
      Parameters:
      eraseSecretData - set to false to retain the credentials data in memory. Defaults to true.
    • isEraseCredentialsAfterAuthentication

      public boolean isEraseCredentialsAfterAuthentication()