Cro

Cro::HTTP::Server

The Cro::HTTP::Server class is the most convenient way to host a HTTP or HTTPS service in Cro. Instances of Cro::HTTP::Server do the Cro::Service role, and as such have the start and stop methods. The only required configuration for a Cro::HTTP::Server is an application, which is any Cro::Transform that consumes a Cro::HTTP::Request and produces a Cro::HTTP::Response. This will often be produced using Cro::HTTP::Router.

A minimal setup§

The following example demonstrates how Cro::HTTP::Server can be used to host a simple "Hello, world" HTTP application, configuring it to listen on port 8888 of localhost. A signal handler is added to allow for clean shutdown of the server upon Ctrl + C.

use Cro::HTTP::Router;
use Cro::HTTP::Server;

my $application = route {
    get -> {
        content 'text/html', '<strong>Hello, world!</strong>';
    }
}

my Cro::Service $hello-service = Cro::HTTP::Server.new(
    :host('localhost'), :port(8888), :$application
);
$hello-service.start;
react whenever signal(SIGINT) {
    $hello-service.stop;
    exit;
}

Configuring HTTPS§

By default, Cro::HTTP::Server will operates as a HTTP server. To set it up as a HTTPS server instead, use the tls named parameter. It expects to receive a hash of arguments providing the TLS configuration, which it will in turn pass to the constructor of Cro::TLS::Listener. Typically, certificate-file and private-key-file, specifying the locations of files containing a certificate and private key respectively, should be passed.

my %tls = private-key-file => 'server.pem',
          certificate-file => 'cert.pem';
my Cro::Service $hello-service = Cro::HTTP::Server.new(
    :host('localhost'), :port(8888), :%tls, :$application
);

Request body parsers and response body serializers§

Additional request body parsers (implementations of Cro::BodyParser) and response body serializers (implementations of Cro::BodySerializer) can be added at the server level. Alternatively, the set of default set of body parsers and serializers can be replaced entirely.

To add extra body parsers to the set of defaults, pass a list of them to add-body-parsers.

my Cro::Service $hello-service = Cro::HTTP::Server.new(
    :host('localhost'), :port(8888), :$application,
    add-body-parsers => [
        YAMLBodyParser,
        XMLBodyParser
    ]
);

These will take precedence over (that is, tested for applicability ahead of) the default set of body parsers. To replace those entirely, pass a list of the body parsers to use as the body-parsers named parameter:

my Cro::Service $hello-service = Cro::HTTP::Server.new(
    :host('localhost'), :port(8888), :$application,
    body-parsers => [
        # Don't parse any kind of body except a JSON one; anything else
        # will throw an exception when `.body` is called.
        Cro::HTTP::BodyParser::JSON
    ]
);

If both body-parsers and add-body-parsers is used, then both will be used, with those in add-body-parsers again having higher precedence.

If the class that represents a body parser or body serializer does not have attributes, passing type object is equivalent to passing an instance.

add-body-parsers => [
    YAMLBodyParser.new
]
# as well as
add-body-parsers => [
    YAMLBodyParser
]

A similar scheme applies for body serializers. Use add-body-serializers to add extra ones to the defaults:

my Cro::Service $hello-service = Cro::HTTP::Server.new(
    :host('localhost'), :port(8888), :$application,
    add-body-serializers => [
        YAMLBodySerializer,
        XMLBodySerializer
    ]
);

Or replace the set of body serializers entirely by passing body-serializers:

my Cro::Service $hello-service = Cro::HTTP::Server.new(
    :host('localhost'), :port(8888), :$application,
    body-serializers => [
        # The body can only ever be something that can be JSON serialized.
        Cro::HTTP::BodySerializer::JSON
    ]
);

If both add-body-serializers and body-serializers are passed, they both will be used, with those in add-body-serializers taking precedence.

Middleware§

HTTP middleware is implemented as a Cro::Transform. There are four places that HTTP middleware can be inserted. There are, in order of processing:

  • before-parse - operates on the raw bytes coming over the network prior to the Cro::HTTP::RequestParser seeing them. The transform should consume a Cro::TCP::Message and produce a Cro::TCP::Message. It is relatively unusual to need to insert middleware at this stage, though it could be useful for getting rate limiting in early before the effort to even parse a request has been expended, for example.

  • before - operates on requests after they have been parsed, but before they reach the application. Consumes a Cro::HTTP::Request and produces a Cro::HTTP::Request. This is a common place to put middleware that does authentication, authorization, session handling, CSRF protection, and so forth.

  • after - operates on responses produced by the application. Consumes a Cro::HTTP::Response and produces a Cro::HTTP::Response. This is a common place to put middleware that does things like logging and inserting headers to increase security (like X-Frame-Options, Strict-Transport-Security, Content-Security-Policy, and so forth).

  • after-serialize - operates on the bytes sent back over the network in response to a request. Consumes a Cro::TCP::Message and produces a Cro::TCP::Message. It is unusual to need to insert middleware at this stage.

The names of these places are named parameters that can be passed to the Cro::HTTP::Server constructor. Either a single Cro::Transform or an Iterable (for example, List) of Cro::Transforms may be passed.

For example, the following piece of middleware:

class StrictTransportSecurity does Cro::Transform {
        has Duration:D $.max-age is required;

        method consumes() { Cro::HTTP::Response }
        method produces() { Cro::HTTP::Response }

        method transformer(Supply $pipeline --> Supply) {
            supply {
                whenever $pipeline -> $response {
                    $response.append-header:
                        'Strict-Transport-Security',
                        "max-age=$!max-age";
                    emit $response;
                }
            }
        }
    }

Could be applied as follows:

my Cro::Service $hello-service = Cro::HTTP::Server.new(
    :host('localhost'), :port(8888), :$application,
    after => StrictTransportSecurity.new(Duration.new(30 * 24 * 60 * 60))
);

HTTP versions§

The :http option can be passed to control which versions of HTTP should be supported. It can be passed a single item or list. Valid options are 1.1 (which will implicitly handle HTTP/1.0 too) and 2.

:http<1.1>      # HTTP/1.1 only
:http<2>        # HTTP/2 only
:http<1.1 2>    # HTTP/1.1 and HTTP/2 (TLS only; selected by ALPN)

The default is :http<1.1> for a HTTP server. For a HTTPS server, if the TLS library (IO::Socket::Async::SSL) detects that ALPN support is available then it will default to :http<1.1 2>; otherwise it will default to :http<1.1>. If :http<1.1 2> is specified and ALPN support is not available, then an exception will be thrown. ALPN is the only supported mechanism for selecting between HTTP/1.1 and HTTP/2, thus the requirement on it for this configuration (and why there is no option for both versions with HTTP).

Allowed request methods§

By default, the following HTTP request methods are allowed:

  • GET

  • HEAD

  • POST

  • PUT

  • DELETE

  • PATCH

  • CONNECT

  • OPTIONS

A request using a request method other than these shall be refused. To change set of allowed request methods, pass a list using the allowed-methods named constructor parameter:

my $service = Cro::HTTP::Server.new(
    :host('localhost'), :port(8888), :$application,
    :allowed-methods<GET HEAD PUT POST DELETE LINK UNLINK>
);
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