Permissions examples

In order to better understand how the Kinto permission model works, it is possible to refer to this set of examples:

Example Description
Blog Everyone can read; Authors can write / read / create articles
Wiki Authenticated users can write / read / create; Everyone can read.
Company Wiki Employees can write / read /create anything; Managers can add employees
Microblogging A micro blogging platform like twitter

A Blog

Consider a blog where:

  • A list of administrators can CRUD everything;
  • Some moderators can create articles and update existing ones;
  • Anybody can read.

The following objects are created:

  • A bucket servicedenuages_blog;
  • A collection articles;
  • A group moderators with members fxa:<remy id> and fxa:<tarek id>.
Object Permissions Principals
Bucket servicedenuages_blog write fxaoauth:<alexis id> fxaoauth:<mathieu id>
Collection article write /bucket/servicedenuages_blog/groups/moderators
read system.Everyone

A Wiki

  • Authenticated users can create, retrieve, update and delete anything;
  • Everyone can read articles.

The following objects are created:

  • A wiki bucket, where new groups can be created by authenticated users;
  • An article collection is created.
Object Permissions Principals
Bucket wiki write fxa:<wiki administrator id>
Collection articles write system.Authenticated
read system.Everyone

A Company Wiki

  • Employees of the company can CRUD anything;
  • Managers can add employees to the wiki;
  • Other people don’t have access.

The following objects are created:

  • A companywiki bucket;
  • An articles collection;
  • An employees group.
Object Permissions Principals
Bucket companywiki write fxa:<wiki administrator id>
Group employees write /buckets/companywiki/groups/managers
Collection articles write /buckets/companywiki/groups/employees /buckets/companywiki/groups/managers

A microblogging

A microblog is a service to share short articles with people such as Twitter, Google+ or Facebook.

  • The microblog administrator creates the bucket;
  • Each collection is isolated from the others, and only one person have all permissions on all records;
  • Records are private by default, and published to specific audiences.

The following objects are created:

  • A microblog bucket, where groups can be created by authenticated users;
  • A single article collection;
  • A group alexis_buddies, whose members are chosen by Alexis (a.k.a circle);
  • Some records (messages) with specific visibility (public, direct message, private for a group)
Object Permissions Principals
Bucket microblog write fxa:<microblog administrator id>
group:create system.Authenticated
Collection articles record:create system.Authenticated
Group alexis_buddies write fxa:<alexis id>
A public message write fxa:<alexis id>
read system.Everyone
A direct message for a user write fxa:<alexis id>
read fxa:<tarek id>
A private message for a group write fxa:<alexis id>
read /buckets/microblog/groups/alexis_following

Each time a user creates a new record, it needs to setup the ACLs attached to it.

With this model it is also possible to setup a shared microblogging account giving record’s write permission to a group of users.

Note

Another model could be to let users create their own collections of records.

Mozilla Payments tracking

For the payment tracking use case, three players are involved:

  • The payment app, storing receipts for buyers and sellers;
  • The selling app, reading receipts for a given seller;
  • The buyer app reading receipts for a given buyer.

Users shouldn’t be able to write receipts themselves, sellers and users should only be able to read their owns.

The following objects are created:

  • the mozilla bucket;
  • the payment collection.
Object Permissions Principals
Bucket payments write hawk:<payment app>
On every record read hawk:<selling app> fxa:<buyer id>

This ensures every app can list the receipts of every buyer, and that each buyer can also list their receipts. However, only the payment application can create / edit new ones.