HTTP configuration (part 2)

Here are the rest of the Liberator configuration items that define how Liberator handles HTTP connections with clients.

Liberator’s supplied with a built-in HTTP Config blade that’s automatically activated when you install the Liberator (see Built-in blades). For more about how to change the configuration of this blade, see How can I…​ Configure how Liberator handles HTTP connections.

More HTTP-related configuration items can be found in HTTP Configuration (part 1).

add-authdir

add-authdir specifies an HTTP-authenticated directory.

Syntax
add-authdir
   check-module     [type]
   name             [string]
   password         [string array]
   realm            [string]
   secure-passwords [boolean]
   username         [string array]
end-authdir
Options
check-module

Type: boolean | Default: FALSE

When check-module is TRUE, the Liberator’s auth module is used to authorise a user’s access to the HTTP directory specified in name, instead of using the list of usernames and passwords supplied in this add-authdir item.

For example, if the Auth module is cfgauth, the authorised usernames and passwords are defined in the username and password options of the cfgauth configuration item add-user.

name

Type: string | Default: /status

The full HTTP directory name.

The default is the Liberator’s status page.

password

Type: string array | Default: admin

A space-separated list of passwords. Each password relates to the username in the corresponding position in the list. See Note 1 below.

The passwords can be encrypted in MD5 hash format so that they are secure; in this case, set secure-passwords to TRUE.

realm

Type: string | Default: Liberator Admin

The HTTP basic authentication realm. (This string is shown in the Liberator login window that pops up at the client when the login isn’t through KeyMaster single sign-on.)

secure-passwords

Type: boolean | Default: FALSE

When secure-passwords is TRUE, the password received for a username is encrypted in MD5 hash format before being validated against the corresponding password defined in the password option.

username

Type: string | Default: admin

A space-separated list of usernames defining the users who can access the HTTP directory specified in name.

See Note 1 below.

Note 1: You can specify multiple usernames and passwords in the following ways: either as space-separated lists, as individual entries, or a combination of the two.

Example 1. Space separated lists
add-authdir
   username   Alf Bill Carl Dave
   password   pwA pwB pwC pwD
end-authdir

In the above example user Alf's password is pwA, user Bill's password is pwB, and so on.

Example 2. Individual entries
add-authdir
   username   Alf
   password   pwA
   username   Bill
   password   pwB
   username   Carl Dave
   password   pwC pwD
end-authdir

In the above example user Alf's password is still pwA, but it’s been specified in a password option that immediately follows the username option for Alf, and similarly for user Bill whose password is pwB.

add-useragent

add-useragent enables various HTTP protocol extensions for a specific HTTP client or clients, as identified by the client’s user agent string.

Syntax
add-useragent
   useragent-pattern [string]
   extensions        flag1|flag2|flag3|...
end-useragent
Options
useragent-pattern

Type: string | Default: null

A regular expression that Liberator uses to match the user agent string sent to it from an HTTP client.

For examples of user agent strings, see User-Agent - HTTP on the Mozilla Developer Network.

You can also identify the user agent string sent to Liberator from a particular HTTP client by logging into the Liberator from the HTTP client and then looking in the Liberator’s http-access-log.

extensions

Type: string | Default: value of http-extensions

Flags that enable various HTTP protocol extensions. These flags allow you to turn on HTTP features that can improve utilisation of the client-Liberator connection for HTTP clients whose user agent strings match the value of the useragent-pattern option.

Valid values are as for the http-extensions configuration item.

For HTTP clients that match useragent-pattern, the extensions option adds to and/or overrides the settings of the http-extensions configuration item.

You can specify the flags in one extensions option, like this:

http-extensions flag1|flag2|flag3

or in multiple options, like this:

http-extensions flag1
http-extensions flag2
http-extensions flag3

See the examples below.

Examples:

Example 3. MSIE (all versions)
add-useragent
   useragent-pattern MSIE
   extensions force-type5-chunked
end-useragent

This example enables the force-type5-chunked Liberator HTTP extension for requests from all versions of Microsoft Internet Explorer. For more information on this Liberator HTTP extension, see the documentation for the global http-extensions configuration item.

Example 4. MSIE (11)
add-useragent
   useragent-pattern "MSIE 11\."
   allow-extensions force-type5-chunked
end-useragent

This example enables the force-type5-chunked Liberator HTTP extension for requests from Microsoft Internet Explorer 11. For more information on this Liberator HTTP extension, see the documentation for the global http-extensions configuration item.

Example 5. Google Chrome (all versions)
add-useragent
   useragent-pattern Chrome
   extensions allow-sse-deflate|allow-ws-permessage-deflate
end-useragent

This example enables the allow-sse-deflate and allow-ws-permessage-deflate Liberator HTTP extensions for connections from all versions of Google Chrome. For more information on these HTTP extensions, see the documentation for the global http-extensions configuration item.

See also: