How can I use DBD::Proxy with DBIx::Class? - perl

I need to get a database connection through a firewall, and also limit what queries can be run. DBD::Proxy seems to be the perfect solution for this. However, I'm currently using DBIx::Class, and can't figure out how to hook them together.
In particular, DBD::Proxy doesn't take SQL; it takes particular named queries. But DBIx::Class doesn't seem to have a way to invoke those named queries.
This is inside a Catalyst-based webapp.

DBD::Proxy does take SQL. It allows for named queries as a convenience.
There is no convenient way to use DBIx::Class with DBD::Proxy named queries, since the purpose of the DBIx::Class Object-Relational Mapper (ORM) is to present an object-oriented view of SQL's Data Manipulation Language (DML) statements. The named query feature of DBD::Proxy is not a DML statement, so DBIx::Class does not have feature that suit your needs: passing a literal string directly to the prepare() function of your DBD::Proxy driver.
Some inconvenient ways:
Don't use DBIx::Class. Just do it in DBI. You could use Catalyst::Model::DBI, or plain DBI + catalyst::Model::Adaptor + your own model class.
Don't use named queries. This means that if you were planning to use named queries as a way to control access to the database, then you'll need to move the query authorization
logic into the code that makes the call to the database inside your controller or model, depending on how you built your application.

Related

Is it possible to evaluate a Postgres expression without connecting to a database?

PostgreSQL has excellent support for evaluating JSONPath expressions against JSON data.
For example, this query returns true because the value of the nested field is indeed "foo".
select '{"header": {"nested": "foo"}}'::jsonb #? '$.header ? (#.nested == "foo")'
Notably this query does not reference any schemas or tables. Ideally, I would like to use this functionality of PostgreSQL without creating or connecting to a full database instance. Is it possible to run PostgreSQL in such a way that it doesn't have schemas or tables, but is still able to evaluate "standalone" queries?
Some other context on the project, we need to evaluate JSONPath expressions against JSON data in both a Postgres database and Python application. Unfortunately, Python does not have any JSONPath libraries that support enough of the spec to be useful to us.
Ideally, I would like to use this functionality of PostgreSQL without creating or connecting to a full database instance.
Well, it is open source. You can always pull out the source code for this functionality you want and adapt it to compile by itself. But that seems like a large and annoying undertaking, and I probably wouldn't do it. And short of that, no.
Why do you need this? Are you worried about scalability or ease of installation or performance or what? If you are already using PostgreSQL anyway, firing up a dummy connection to just fire some queries at the JSONB engine doesn't seem too hard.

Increase security of DB INSERT

Currently, I have a PostGIS DB, and I have the basics working. However, I am inserting directly into the database using pg_query. I have been recommended to use pg_query_params to help prevent against SQL injections, but am unsure how to implement this. Below is a cut-down example of my current insert statement for a site location. How would I, for example, utilise pg_query_params with this example? I know I will have to implement further security, but it is a starting point.
EDIT: I was going to use the drupal form API but it gave me headaches. I realize that would do a lot of this stuff automatically.
$sql = "INSERT INTO sites_tbl (river_id ,sitename ,the_geom) VALUES ('$_POST[river_id]','$_POST[sitename]',st_geomfromtext('POINT($geomstring)',27700))";
$result = pg_query($sql);
Because you are using strings rather than parameters, your example is vulnerable to SQL injection. It's best to avoid pg_ functions. In your case there are two things you need to take into account:
Learn the Drupal API (considering you are using Drupal this would be the best for code consistency
or
Use stored procedures
Use a library like PDO or pg_query_params which takes care of parameterized queries
Normally you use stored procedures in addition to PDO, unfortunately sometimes this is not manageable because you have too much code. My advice is to use as much stored procedures as possible.

NoSql Injection in Python

when trying to make this question, i got this one it is using Java, and in the answer it gave a Ruby example, and it seems that the injection happens only when using Json? because i've an expose where i'll try to compare between NoSQL and SQL and i was trying to said: be happy, nosql has no sql injection since it's not sql ...
can you please explain me:
how sql injection happens when using Python driver (pymongo).
how to avoid it.
the comparison using the old way sql injection using the comment in the login form.
There are a couple of concerns with injection in MongoDB:
$where JS injection - Building JavaScript functions from user input can result in a query that can behave differently to what you expect. JavaScript functions in general are not a responsible method to program MongoDB queries and it is highly recommended to not use them unless absolutely needed.
Operator injection - If you allow users to build (from the front) a $or or something they could easily manipulate this ability to change your queries. This of course does not apply if you just take data from a set of text fields and manually build a $or from that data.
JSON injection - Quite a few people recently have been trying to convert a full JSON document sent (saw this first in JAVA, ironically) from some client side source into a document for insertion into MongoDB. I shouldn't need to even go into why this is bad. A JSON value for a field is fine since, of course, MongoDB is BSON.
As #Burhan stated injection comes from none sanitized input. Fortunately for MongoDB it has object orientated querying.
The problem with SQL injection comes from the word "SQL". SQL is a querying language built up of strings. On the other hand MongoDB actually uses a BSON document to specify a query (an Object). If you keep to the basic common sense rules I gave you above you should never have a problem with an attack vector like:
SELECT * FROM tbl_user WHERE ='';DROP TABLE;
Also MongoDB only supports one operation per command atm (without using eval, don't ever do that though) so that wouldn't work anyway...
I should add that this does not apply to data validation only injection.
SQL injection has nothing to do with the database. It is a type of vulnerability that allows for execution of arbitrary SQL commands because the target system does not sanitize the SQL that is given to the SQL server.
It doesn't matter if you are on NoSQL or not. If you have a system running on mongodb (or couchdb, or XYZ db), and you provide a front end where users can enter records - and you don't correctly escape and sanitize the input coming from the front end; you are open to SQL injection.

Is writing eSQL database independent or not?

Using EF we can use LINQ to read data which is rather simple (especially using fluent calls), but we have less control unless we write eSQL on our own.
Is writing eSQL actually data store independent code?
So if we decide to change data store, can the same statements still be used?
Does writing eSQL strings in your code pose any serious security threats similar to writing TSQL statements as plain strings in C# code? That's why SPs are recommended. Could we still move eSQL scripts outside of code and use some other technique to make them a bit more secure?
ESQL is database independent in general, so it can be used like LINQ to Entities.
But please be aware that it has more serious limitations. It does not have DML, DDL, and DB-specific abilities.
The main ESQL disadvantage is that even simple query containing a couple of lines can be translated into monstrous SQL query for a particular DBMS, so one should check the generated SQL to be appropriate and analyze if it is optimal.
ESQL will not be executed directly on a database, it will be translated to SQL.
EF Security discussion is usually started from the connection string proptection, then model security is discussed, and only after that query protection is analyzed. It's up to the developer to decide if the peculiar query should be protected.

Is it possible to obtain the SQL statements generated by Class::DBI?

I want to find the exact SQL statements that are generated by a Perl ORM package such as Class::DBI. I am not looking for SQL generated for simple inserts and deletes, but for row modifications that result from slightly complicated object manipulations (inserting rows in a table which is a child of a row in a parent table, for example)
Is there some way to get it?
Class::DBI uses DBI under the hood, so you can enable tracing of all SQL statements via an environment variable:
DBI_TRACE=3=dbi.log your-perl-script
Or inside of Perl, before executing any statements:
use DBI;
DBI->trace(2, 'dbi.log');
See http://metacpan.org/pod/DBI#TRACING
Since you said "such as"…
You can set the environment variable DBIC_TRACE to 1 if you are using DBIx::Class (which has a Class::DBI compatibility layer).