Advice needed on correct design.

[MuZZy]

Hi,

I'm going to develop a pretty simple document management application and
i want to use WCF to connect back-end to smart client front-end.

That application will allow to create a hierarchcal structure where any
node can be linked with a document file, which are all stored in a SQL
Server database.

I'm trying to convince my boss towards smartclient instead of ASP.NET
app and i need to create a simple "proof-of-concept" - to start with i
need a login screen and ability to login with some predefined
(hardcoded) usernames.

I was looking at the examples in SDK and all of them are using some 509x
authentication for which a certificate needs to be installed and some
other stuff. I don't need all that; what i need is to be able to pass
username+password to backedn, verify there against my database and
return result. I'm sure this type of authentication is possible with WCF
but i can't find a simple example showing that.

I would really appreciate any example/idea/reference!

PS. I plan to have 3 layers: data layer(low level communication with
database - i already have it form our existing project), business layer
(all authentication logic, all other methods between UI and data layer)
and UI, connected to business layer using WCF.

Thank you,
MuZZy

[Steven Cheng[MSFT]]

Hello MuZzy,

Glad to see you again :).

From your description, you're going to build a client-server based
distribute applciation and want to utilize the WCF for remote
communication, and is currently wondering how to add the security
authentication in the WCF transfering which simply based on your custom
username/password database, correct?

Based on my understanding, what you want can be done through Username
authentication which is both provided in the .NET WebService Enhancement
and the new WCF. Actually, the WSE and WCF has implemented the standard
username token authentication and it is one of the authentication schemas
you can choose in WCF(there are some others like windows authentication or
X509 certificate authentication). The basic design of such scenario in WCF
is as below:

** server-side service use a certain binding (http or TCP) which configured
to use "Message" security and choose "Username" for clientAuthentication
type.

** in client-side you can provide username token and set it into service's
client proxy object before calling WCF service.

Here is a msdn reference demonstrating an example that username
authentication schema:

#Message Security with a Username Client
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms731058.aspx

Hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Steven Cheng

Microsoft MSDN Online Support Lead

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