Database Auth Configuration

Introduction

To configure a synchronized database LDAP authentication provider, navigate to the providers array inside your config/auth.php file, and paste the following users provider:

You will have to remove/alter the default users provider, or create your own.

// config/auth.php

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        'driver' => 'ldap',
        'model' => LdapRecord\Models\ActiveDirectory\User::class,
        'rules' => [],
        'scopes' => [],
        'database' => [
            'model' => App\Models\User::class,
            'sync_passwords' => false,
            'sync_attributes' => [
                'name' => 'cn',
                'email' => 'mail',
            ],
        ],
    ],
],

As you can see above, a database array is used to configure the association between your LDAP user and your Eloquent user.

Important:

If your application requires more than one LDAP connection, you must create a new provider for each connection.

This new provider must have its own unique model class which must use your alternate configured connection name using the $connection property.

In the scenario of having multiple LDAP connections, it may be helpful to namespace the LDAP models you create with the desired connection. For example:

App\Ldap\DomainAlpha\User

This will allow you to segregate scopes, rules and other classes to their relating connection.

Driver

The driver option must be ldap as this is what indicates to Laravel the proper authentication driver to use.

Model

The model option must be the class name of your LdapRecord model. This model will be used for fetching users from your directory.

Rules

The rules option must be an array of authentication rule class name's.

Overview

LDAP authentication rules give you the ability to allow or deny users from signing in to your application using a condition you would like to apply. These rules are executed after a user successfully passes LDAP authentication against your configured server.

Think of them as a final authorization gate before they are allowed in.

Authentication rules are never executed if a user fails LDAP authentication.

Creating Rules

Let's create an LDAP rule that only allows members of our domain Administrators group.

To create an authentication rule, call the ldap:make:rule command:

php artisan ldap:make:rule OnlyAdministrators

A rule will then be created in your applications app/Ldap/Rules directory:

<?php

namespace App\Ldap\Rules;

use LdapRecord\Laravel\Auth\Rule;
use LdapRecord\Models\Model as LdapRecord;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model as Eloquent;

class OnlyAdministrators implements Rule
{
    /**
     * Check if the rule passes validation.
     */
    public function passes(LdapRecord $user, Eloquent $model = null): bool
    {
        //
    }
}

In the authentication rule, there are two properties made available to us.

• A $user property that is the LdapRecord model of the authenticating user
• A $model property that is the Eloquent model of the authenticating user

Now, we will update the passes method to check the LDAP users groups relationship to see if they are a member:

<?php

namespace App\Ldap\Rules;

use LdapRecord\Laravel\Auth\Rule;
use LdapRecord\Models\Model as LdapRecord;
use LdapRecord\Models\ActiveDirectory\Group;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model as Eloquent;

class OnlyAdministrators implements Rule
{
    public function passes(LdapRecord $user, Eloquent $model = null): bool
    {
        $administrators = Group::find('cn=Administrators,dc=local,dc=com');

        return $user->groups()->recursive()->exists($administrators);
    }
}

We call the recursive method on the relationship to make sure that we load groups of groups in case the user is not an immediate member of the Administrators group.

Once we have our rule defined, we will add it into our authentication provider in the config/auth.php file:

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        'driver' => 'ldap',
        'model' => LdapRecord\Models\ActiveDirectory\User::class,
        'rules' => [
            App\Ldap\Rules\OnlyAdministrators::class,
        ],
        'database' => [
            // ...
        ],
    ],
],

Now when you attempt to log in to your application with an LDAP user that successfully passes LDAP authentication, they will need to be a member of the Administrators group.

If you are caching your configuration, make sure you re-run config:cache to re-cache your modifications.

Scopes

The scopes option must be an array of LdapRecord scope class names.

Overview

The scopes inserted in this option allow you to apply query scopes to your configured model, only during import and authentication. This is option is useful for when you don't want to add global scopes to your configured model, but would like to scope the query used to retrieve users during import and authentication into your application.

Creating Scopes

Let's create an LDAP scope that scopes the authentication query to only return users that are located inside the Accounting Organizational Unit.

To create a new LDAP scope, call the ldap:make:scope command:

php artisan ldap:make:scope Accounting

A scope will then be created in your applications app/Ldap/Scopes directory:

<?php

namespace App\Ldap\Scopes;

use LdapRecord\Models\Model;
use LdapRecord\Models\Scope;
use LdapRecord\Query\Model\Builder;

class Accounting implements Scope
{
    /**
     * Apply the scope to the given query.
     */
    public function apply(Builder $query, Model $model): void
    {
        // ...
    }
}

Now let's update the apply method to only return users located inside the Accounting Organizational Unit:

We're using automatic base DN subsitution in query below by supplying {base} in the $query->in() method.

class Accounting implements Scope
{
    /**
     * Apply the scope to the given query.
     */
    public function apply(Builder $query, Model $model): void
    {
        $query->in('ou=Accounting,{base}');
    }
}

Once we have our scope defined, we will add it into our authentication provider in the config/auth.php file:

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        'driver' => 'ldap',
        'model' => LdapRecord\Models\ActiveDirectory\User::class,
        'rules' => [],
        'scopes' => [
            App\Ldap\Scopes\Accounting::class,
        ],
    ],
],

Now when you attempt to log in to your application with an LDAP user, that LDAP user must be located inside the Accounting Organizational Unit to be able to authenticate into your application.

If you are caching your configuration, make sure you re-run config:cache to re-cache your modifications.

Database Model

The database => model key is the class name of the Eloquent model that will be used for creating and retrieving LDAP users from your applications database.

Be sure to add the required trait and interface to this model as shown in the installation guide.

Sync Password Column

If your application uses a different password column than password, then you may configure it using the below methods depending on your Laravel version.

Laravel >= 11

In your User Eloquent model, define a getAuthPasswordName method that returns the name of your password column:

// app/Models/User.php

class User extends Authenticatable
{
    public function getAuthPasswordName(): string
    {
        return 'my_password_column';
    }
}

Laravel < 11

In your config/auth.php file, set the password_column key to the name of your password column:

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        // ...
        'database' => [
            // ...
            'password_column' => 'my_password_column',
        ],
    ],
],

Remove Password Column

If your users table does not have a password column, you must use the config/auth.php file method regardless of Laravel version and set the password_column to false:

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        // ...
        'database' => [
            // ...
            'password_column' => false,
        ],
    ],
],

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        // ...
        'database' => [
            // ...
            'password_column' => 'my_password_column',
        ],
    ],
],

You can also set the value to false if your database table does not have any password column at all:

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        // ...
        'database' => [
            // ...
            'password_column' => false,
        ],
    ],
],

Sync Passwords

The database => sync_passwords option enables password synchronization.

Password synchronization captures and hashes the users password upon login if they pass LDAP authentication. This helps in situations where you may want to provide a "back up" option in case your LDAP server is unreachable, as well as a way of determining if a users password is valid without having to call to your LDAP server and validate it for you.

If you do not define the sync_passwords key or have it set false, a user is always applied a random 16 character hashed password. This hashed password is only set once upon initial import or login so no needless updates are performed on user records.

Sync Attributes

The database => sync_attributes array defines a set of key-value pairs that describe which database column should be set and to which LDAP property:

'sync_attributes' => [
    'email' => 'mail',
    'name' => 'cn',
]

• The key of each array item is the attribute of your User Eloquent model
• The value is the name of the users LDAP attribute to set the Eloquent model attribute value to

You do not need to add your users guid or domain database columns. These are done automatically for you.

For further control on sync attributes, see the below attribute handler feature.

Sync Existing Records

The database => sync_existing array defines a set of key-value pairs that describe how existing database users should be sychronized:

'sync_existing' => [
    'email' => 'mail',
],

• The key of each array item is the column of your users database table to query
• The value is the name of the users LDAP attribute to set the database value to

Alternatively inside each value key, you may provide an array with an attribute key containing the LDAP attribute name and an operator key to use for the query when retrieving a record from the database. More on this below.

Important: If the LDAP attribute returns null for the given value, the actual value will be used in the query instead. This is helpful to be able to use raw strings to scope your query by.

Let's walk through an example.

In our application, we have existing users inside our database:

id	name	email	password	guid	domain
1	Steve Bauman	sbauman@local.com	...	null	null
2	John Doe	jdoe@local.com	...	null	null

As you can see above, these users have null values for their guid and domain columns.

If you do not define a sync_existing array and a user logs in with sbauman@local.com, you will receive a SQL exception. This is because LdapRecord was unable to locate a local database user using the users GUID. If this occurs, LdapRecord will attempt to insert a new user with the same email address.

To resolve this issue, we will insert the following sync_existing array:

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        // ...
        'database' => [
            // ...
            'sync_existing' => [
                'email' => 'mail',
            ],
        ],
    ],
],

Now when sbauman@local.com attempts to log in, if the user cannot be located by their GUID, they will instead be located by their email address. Their GUID, domain, and sync attributes you define will then synchronize.

Database Compatibility

In some database drivers, such as Postgres, there is case-sensitivity when executing where clauses with the equals (=) operator. Consider the following data in your database:

id	name	email	password	guid	domain
1	Steve Bauman	sbauman@local.com	...	null	null
2	John Doe	jdoe@local.com	...	null	null

However, inside the LDAP server, the mail attribute for Steve's record is actually SBauman@local.com. While he could successfully authenticate, the existing record would not be found in our database due to Postgres' more strict SQL grammar. Changing the sync_existing configuration to the following array syntax would allow us to change the operator from an equals (=) to an ilike.

'sync_existing' => [
    'email' => [
        'attribute' => 'mail',
        'operator' => 'ilike',
    ],
],

By replacing the value of the array to be an array with the attribute and operator keys, we can fine-tune the query syntax to be more flexible to your needs.

Attribute Handlers

If you require logic for synchronizing attributes when users sign in to your application or are being imported, you can create an attribute handler class responsible for setting / synchronizing your database models attributes from their LDAP model.

This class you define must have either a handle or __invoke method. This method must accept the LDAP model you have configured as the first parameter and your Eloquent database model as the second.

For the example below, we will create a handler named AttributeHandler.php inside your app/Ldap folder:

You do not need to call save() on your Eloquent database model. This is called for you after attribute synchronization.

<?php

namespace App\Ldap;

use App\Models\User as DatabaseUser;
use App\Ldap\User as LdapUser;

class AttributeHandler
{
    public function handle(LdapUser $ldap, DatabaseUser $database)
    {
        $database->name = $ldap->getFirstAttribute('cn');
        $database->email = $ldap->getFirstAttribute('mail');
    }
}

Attribute handlers are created using Laravel's app() helper, so you may type-hint any dependencies you require in your handlers constructor to be made available during synchronization.

Then inside your config/auth.php file for your provider, set the attribute handler class as the sync_attributes value:

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        // ...
        'database' => [
            // ...
            'sync_attributes' => \App\Ldap\AttributeHandler::class,
        ],
    ],
],

You may also add multiple if you'd prefer, or combine them with key => value pairs:

// ...
'database' => [
    // ...
    'sync_attributes' => [
        'name' => 'cn',
        'email' => 'mail',
        \App\Ldap\MyFirstAttributeHandler::class,
        \App\Ldap\MySecondAttributeHandler::class,
    ],
],

Attributes you specify are synchronized in order (first to last), so you may access the already synchronized attributes in subsequent attribute handlers.

All Available Options

Below is a synchronized database provider that is configured with all available options:

// config/auth.php

'providers' => [
    // ...

    'users' => [
        'driver' => 'ldap',
        'model' => LdapRecord\Models\ActiveDirectory\User::class,
        'rules' => [],
        'scopes' => [],
        'database' => [
            'model' => App\Models\User::class,
            'sync_passwords' => true,
            'sync_attributes' => [
                'name' => 'cn',
                'email' => 'mail',
            ],
            'sync_existing' => [
                'email' => 'mail',
            ],
            'password_column' => 'password',
        ],
    ],
],