Authentication in Azure Management Libraries for Java

To use the APIs in the Azure Management Libraries for Java, as the first step you need to create an authenticated client. There are several possible approaches to authentication. This document illustrates a couple of the simpler ones

Using an authentication file

:warning: Note, file-based authentication is an experimental feature that may or may not be available in later releases. The file format it relies on is subject to change as well.

To create an authenticated Azure client:

Azure azure = Azure.authenticate(new File("my.azureauth")).withDefaultSubscription();

The authentication file, referenced as "my.azureauth" in the example above, contains the information of a service principal. You can generate this file using Azure CLI 2.0 through the following command. Make sure you selected your subscription by az account set --subscription <name or id> and you have the privileges to create service principals.

az ad sp create-for-rbac --sdk-auth > my.azureauth

If you don't have Azure CLI installed, you can also do this in the cloud shell. Alternatively, you can login to Java SDK through other ways of authentication and create an auth file by following this sample. For detailed explanations of the content in this auth file, or directions to create the auth file manually, please see Auth file formats.

Using `ApplicationTokenCredentials`

Similarly to the file-based approach, this method requires a service principal registration, but instead of storing the credentials in a local file, the required inputs can be supplied directly via an instance of the ApplicationTokenCredentials class:

ApplicationTokenCredentials credentials = new ApplicationTokenCredentials(
        client, tenant, key, AzureEnvironment.AZURE);
Azure azure = Azure.authenticate(credentials).withSubscription(subscriptionId);

or

ApplicationTokenCredentials credentials = new ApplicationTokenCredentials(
        client, tenant, pfxCertificatePath, password, AzureEnvironment.AZURE);
Azure azure = Azure.authenticate(credentials).withSubscription(subscriptionId);

where client, tenant, subscriptionId, and key or pfxCertificatePath and password are strings with the required pieces of information about your service principal and subscription. The last parameter, AzureEnvironment.AZURE represents the Azure worldwide public cloud. You can use a different value out of the currently supported alternatives in the AzureEnvironment enum.

Using credentials from Azure CLI Automatically (Preview)

If you have Azure CLI (>=2.0) installed and authenticated on your machine, the SDK client is able to use the current account and subscription Azure CLI is logged in.

Run az login to authenticate to Azure CLI and az account set --subscription <subscription Id> in your terminal to select the subscription to use. Initialize the Azure client as following:

Azure azure = Azure.authenticate(AzureCliCredentials.create()).withDefaultSubscription();

And you are good to go.

If Azure CLI is authenticated as a user, tokens acquired in Azure CLI expire after 90 days. You will be prompted to re-authenticate. If Azure CLI is authenticated with a service principal, it will never expire until the service principal credential expires.

Using `MSICredentials` & `AppServiceMSICredentials`

For the MSI enabled Virtual Machine and App Service, Azure creates Service Principal and injects the credentials for the Service Principal into the resource.

The MSICredential & AppServiceMSICredentails type retrieves these Azure assigned credentials underneath and use it to authenticate.

Using MSI credentials from VirtualMachine

  MSICredentials vmMsiCredentials = new MSICredentials();

In order to retrieve the Azure Assigned credentials, the MSICredential instance requires one of the following:

The object id associated with the Managed Service Identity assigned to the Virtual Machine.

vmMsiCredentials.withObjectId(objectId);

The client (application) Id associated with the Managed Service Identity assigned to the Virtual Machine.

vmMsiCredentials.withClientId(clientId);

The ARM resource id of the user assigned Managed Service Identity assigned to the Virtual Machine.

vmMsiCredentials.withIdentityId(IdentityId);

Azure azure = Azure.authenticate(vmMsiCredentials).withSubscription(subscriptionId);

Using MSI credentials from App Service

  AppServiceMSICredentials appServiceMsiCredentials = new AppServiceMSICredentials();

Azure azure = Azure.authenticate(appServiceMsiCredentials).withSubscription(subscriptionId);

Oauth 2 for web apps

For web apps that authenticate users interactively, Azure Active Directory allows Oauth 2 code grant flow. Create an application in Azure Active Directory and assign delegated permissions to the application: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/develop/active-directory-integrating-applications.

Create an instance of DelegatedTokenCredentials with the info of the application and the redirect URL. The credential instance must also be accessible through the page that's handling the redirection. The credential instance is not authenticated yet until the following steps are finished:

Direct the user to the URL generated through generateAuthenticationUrl(). The URL is under the Active Directory endpoint so make sure the redirect URL is correctly routed to your web app.
The user authenticates to Active Directory by typing in the credentials.
In your redirect URL callback, call setAuthenticationCode(String authCode) with the authentication code passed back from Active Directory.

Now you have a DelegatedTokenCredential instance that's ready to talk to Azure.

Auth file formats

Prior to this release, we've been using Java properties file format containing the following information:

subscription=########-####-####-####-############
client=########-####-####-####-############
tenant=########-####-####-####-############
key=XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
managementURI=https\://management.core.windows.net/
baseURL=https\://management.azure.com/
authURL=https\://login.windows.net/
graphURL=https\://graph.windows.net/

or certificate based format (password is optional if using .pem certificate):

subscription=########-####-####-####-############
client=########-####-####-####-############
tenant=########-####-####-####-############
certificate=<path to certificate file>
certificatePassword=XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
managementURI=https\://management.core.windows.net/
baseURL=https\://management.azure.com/
authURL=https\://login.windows.net/
graphURL=https\://graph.windows.net/

This format is still supported for backward compatibility at least until 2.0 release of the SDK. Meanwhile, the new JSON based auth file format is introduced and supported across the Java SDK, the fluent .NET SDK and the Python SDK (more coming!):

{
  "clientId": "b52dd125-9272-4b21-9862-0be667bdf6dc",
  "clientSecret": "ebc6e170-72b2-4b6f-9de2-99410964d2d0",
  "subscriptionId": "ffa52f27-be12-4cad-b1ea-c2c241b6cceb",
  "tenantId": "72f988bf-86f1-41af-91ab-2d7cd011db47",
  "activeDirectoryEndpointUrl": "https://login.microsoftonline.com",
  "resourceManagerEndpointUrl": "https://management.azure.com/",
  "activeDirectoryGraphResourceId": "https://graph.windows.net/",
  "sqlManagementEndpointUrl": "https://management.core.windows.net:8443/",
  "galleryEndpointUrl": "https://gallery.azure.com/",
  "managementEndpointUrl": "https://management.core.windows.net/"
}

or certificate based format (password is optional if using .pem certificate):

{
  "clientId": "b52dd125-9272-4b21-9862-0be667bdf6dc",
  "clientCertificate": "<path to certificate file>",
  "clientCertificatePassword": "XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX",
  "subscriptionId": "ffa52f27-be12-4cad-b1ea-c2c241b6cceb",
  "tenantId": "72f988bf-86f1-41af-91ab-2d7cd011db47",
  "activeDirectoryEndpointUrl": "https://login.microsoftonline.com",
  "resourceManagerEndpointUrl": "https://management.azure.com/",
  "activeDirectoryGraphResourceId": "https://graph.windows.net/",
  "sqlManagementEndpointUrl": "https://management.core.windows.net:8443/",
  "galleryEndpointUrl": "https://gallery.azure.com/",
  "managementEndpointUrl": "https://management.core.windows.net/"
}

If you are using the default Azure public cloud, you can leave all the URL fields blank.

The clientId and tenantId are from your service principal registration. If your service principal uses key authentication, clientSecret is the password credential added to the service principal. If your service principal uses certificate authentication, clientCertificate is the path to your pem or pfx certificate. In the case of a pfx certificate, you also need to provide the clientCertificatePassword.

This approach enables unattended authentication for your application (i.e. no interactive user login, no token management needed). The subscription represents the subscription ID you want to use as the default subscription. The remaining URIs and URLs represent the end points for the needed Azure services, defaulted to Azure public cloud.

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