Add Authentication to a Request to REST Web Service?

Question

I am using WCF REST Startkit to create a test REST web service. To test it, I create a simple Console application with HTTPClient (provided by the kit) and HttpResponseMessage to make a request to the REST service. Here are some codes:

HttpClient client = new HttpClient(argsParser.BaseAddress); HttpResponseMessage resp = client.Get(argsParser.URI); Console.WriteLine(@"READING DATA FROM {0}{1}", argsParser.BaseAddress, argsParser.URI.Length == 0 ? @"" : string.Format(@"/{0}", argsParse.URI)); resp.EnsureStatusIsSuccessful(); string contentType = resp.Content.ContentType; Console.WriteLine("CONTENT TYPE: {0}", contentType); string content = resp.Content.ReadAsString(); Console.WriteLine( @"CONTENT: {0}", content);

where argsParser is my argument parser class to get base address and URI. It works fine as I said with my REST service in our intranet. However, when I used the test app with a web REST service such as Twitter REST service, I got exceptions.

I think this is caused by my work network settings. BlueCode security has been implemented as an enforcement to all browsers/http requests at work. I have to type in my user/pwd in a prompt window when my browser is accessing to a web REST service like Twitter's first time. After I provide my authentication information, the browser works fine.

So I guess that with HttpClient and HTTPResponseMessage instances created in my console application, I may need to add/attach some authentication information to them. I am not sure what classes or APIs I need to provide the required authentication information?

user488084 · Accepted Answer · 2010-10-26 20:54:15Z

To supply credentials via the Authorization Header with the HttpClient which comes with the WCF REST Starter Kit use this:

1.

 HttpClient client = new HttpClient(); client.TransportSettings.Credentials = new NetworkCredential("user", "pass");

On the server side you can extract those in a RequestInterceptor or in a custom HttpModule, which can also help you do a custom basic authentication with IIS...

2.

You can also add an Authorization token/key, like this:

client.DefaultHeaders.Authorization = new Credential("18f34d01-blah-4959-blah-7db6ac5433cd");

OR you can also put the token in a custom header like this:

client.DefaultHeaders.Add("CustomAuthHeader", "18f34d01-blah-4959-blah-7db6ac5433cd");

On the server side then you extract that specific header....

Here is how you can extract the credentials on the service out of a Message object:

 private string[] ExtractCredentials(Message reqMessage) { HttpRequestMessageProperty request = (HttpRequestMessageProperty)reqMessage.Properties[HttpRequestMessageProperty.Name]; string authHeader = request.Headers["Authorization"]; if (authHeader != null && authHeader.StartsWith("Basic")) { string encodedUserPass = authHeader.Substring(6).Trim(); Encoding encoding = Encoding.GetEncoding("iso-8859-1"); string userPass = encoding.GetString(Convert.FromBase64String(encodedUserPass)); int separator = userPass.IndexOf(':'); string[] credentials = new string[2]; credentials[0] = userPass.Substring(0, separator); credentials[1] = userPass.Substring(separator + 1); return credentials; } return new string[] { }; }

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