KittyPolicy

Minimalistic authorization library extracted from Product Hunt.

Features:

small DSL for defining authorization abilities
not class initializations when performing abilities check
integrations with GraphQL gem.

Installation

Add this line to your application's Gemfile:

gem 'kitty_policy'

And then execute:

$ bundle

Or install it yourself as:

$ gem install kitty_policy

Usage

Step 1 - Define policy object

module ApplicationPolicy
  extend KittyPolicy::DSL

  # generates a method named `can_moderate?`
  # example: no subject, just action
  can :moderate do |user|
    user.admin?
  end

  # generates a method named `can_start_trial?`
  # example: `allow_guest` access
  can :start_trial, allow_guest: true do |user, _subscription|
    !user || user.trial_used?
  end

  # generates a method named `can_create_chat_room?`
  # example: subject as symbol
  can :create, :chat_room do |user|
    user.admin?
  end

  # generates a method named `can_create_post?`
  # example: subject as class, instance not used
  can :create, Post do |user|
    user.can_post?
  end

  # generates a method named `can_edit_post?`
  # example: subject as class, passing subject instance
  can :edit, Post do |user, post|
    user.admin?  || user == post.author
  end

  # generates a method named `can_manage_account?`
  # example: using a private helper method
  can :manage, Account do |user, account|
    user.admin? || member?(user, account)
  end

  private

  # you can extract private helper methods
  def member?(user, account)
    # ...
  end
end

can is just a convince helper to create methods on a module:

ApplicationPolicy.can_moderate?
ApplicationPolicy.can_start_trial?
ApplicationPolicy.can_create_post?
ApplicationPolicy.can_edit_post?
ApplicationPolicy.can_manage_account?

Step 2 - Use policy object

# answers if user can perform certain action
ApplicationPolicy.can?(user, :create, Post)
ApplicationPolicy.can?(user, :create, Post.new)
ApplicationPolicy.can?(user, :create, post)
ApplicationPolicy.can?(user, :start_trial)

# raises `KittyPolicy::AccessDenied` when user can't perform certain action
ApplicationPolicy.authorize!(user, :create, Post)
ApplicationPolicy.authorize!(user, :create, Post.new)
ApplicationPolicy.authorize!(user, :create, post)
ApplicationPolicy.authorize!(user, :start_trial)

(Optional Step) - Group policies into separate files

You can split your logic into multiple policy files:

module Posts::Policy
  extend KittyPolicy::DSL

  # ... define abilities
end

Then you can group them together.

module ApplicationPolicy
  extend Posts::Policy
  extend Ship::Policy
end

Testing with RSpec

require 'spec_helper'
require 'kitty_policy/rspec'

describe ApplicationPolicy do
  include KittyPolicy::RSpec

  describe 'can_moderate?' do
    it 'returns true for admin' do
      expect(User.new(admin: true)).to be_able_to :moderate
    end

    it 'returns false for everyone else' do
      expect(User.new(admin: false)).not_to be_able_to :moderate
    end
  end
end

Delegating abilities

module ApplicationPolicy
  extend KittyPolicy::DSL

  can :edit, Post do |user, post|
    user.id == post.user_id
  end

  # users who can edit post, should edit or delete its media
  can :edit, PostMedia do |user, media|
    can? user, :edit, media.post
  end

  can :destroy, PostMedia do |user, media|
    can? user, :edit, media.post
  end

  # this can be expressed with `delegate_ability` helper

  delegate_ability :edit, PostMedia, to: :post
  delegate_ability :destroy, PostMedia, to: :post, to_ability: :edit

Integration with GraphQL

Field level authorization

# Manually import graphql plugin
require 'kitty_policy/graphql/field_authorization'

class ProductHuntSchema < GraphQL::Schema
  # setup authorization per field
  instrument :field, KittyPolicy::GraphQL::FieldAuthorization.new(
    policy: ApplicationPolicy,        # required
    current_user_key: :current_user,  # optional, default: :current_user
  )

  # ...
end

module Types
  class PostType < BaseObject
    # Same as:
    # if ApplicationPolicy.can?(context[:current_user], :edit, object)
    #   return metrics
    # else
    #   return []
    # end
    field :metrics, [MetricType], null: false, authorize: :edit, fallback: []

    # Same as:
    # if ApplicationPolicy.can?(context[:current_user], :moderate, object)
    #   return moderation_changes_count
    # else
    #   return 0
    # end
    field :moderation_changes_count, Integer, null: false, authorize: :moderate, fallback: 0
  end
end

module Types
  class QueryType < BaseObject
    # With fallback, same as:
    # if ApplicationPolicy.can?(context[:current_user], :view, post)
    #   return post
    # else
    #   return nil
    # end
    field :post, PostType, null: false, authorize_object: :view, fallback: nil do
      argument :id, ID, required: true
    end

    # Without fallback, same as:
    # if ApplicationPolicy.can?(context[:current_user], :view, post)
    #   return post
    # else
    #   raise KittyPolicy::AccessDenied(context[:current_user], :view, post)
    # end
    field :post, PostType, null: false, authorize_object: :view do
      argument :id, ID, required: true
    end
  end
end

Can resolver

Exposes if current user can perform certain action.

# Manually import graphql plugin
require 'kitty_policy/graphql/can_resolver'

module Resolvers
  Can = KittyPolicy::GraphQL::CanResolver.new(
    policy: ApplicationPolicy,        # required
    current_user_key: :current_user,  # optional, default: :current_user
    base_resolver: BaseResolver,      # optional, default: ::GraphQL::Schema::Resolver,
  )
end

module Types
  class PostType < BaseObject
    # ...

    field :can_edit, resolver: Resolvers::Can.perform(:edit)                   # -> ApplicationPolicy.can?(edit, post)
    field :can_moderate, resolver: Resolvers::Can.perform(:moderate) { :site } # -> ApplicationPolicy.can?(:moderate, :site)
  end
end

Development

After checking out the repo, run bin/setup to install dependencies. Then, run rake spec to run the tests. You can also run bin/console for an interactive prompt that will allow you to experiment.

To install this gem onto your local machine, run bundle exec rake install. To release a new version, update the version number in version.rb, and then run bundle exec rake release, which will create a git tag for the version, push git commits and tags, and push the .gem file to rubygems.org.

Contributing

Fork it
Create your feature branch (git checkout -b my-new-feature)
Commit your changes (git commit -am 'Add some feature')
Push to the branch (git push origin my-new-feature)
Run the tests (rake)
Create new Pull Request

License

The gem is available as open source under the terms of the MIT License.

Code of Conduct

Everyone interacting in the KittyPolicy project’s codebases, issue trackers, chat rooms and mailing lists is expected to follow the code of conduct.