snap-0.5.2: Snap: A Haskell Web Framework: project starter executable and glue code library

Snap.Extension

Contents

- Introduction
  - Using Snap Extensions
    - Define Application State and Monad
    - Provide Instances For "HasState" Classes
    - Define The Initializer
    - Simplified Snap Extension Server

Synopsis

- data SnapExtend s a
- data Initializer s
- class InitializerState s where
  - extensionId :: s -> ByteString
  - mkCleanup :: s -> IO ()
  - mkReload :: s -> IO ()
- runInitializer :: Bool -> Initializer s -> SnapExtend s () -> IO (Snap (), IO (), IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)])
- runInitializerWithReloadAction :: Bool -> Initializer s -> SnapExtend s () -> (IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)] -> SnapExtend s ()) -> IO (Snap (), IO ())
- runInitializerWithoutReloadAction :: Initializer s -> SnapExtend s () -> IO (Snap (), IO ())
- mkInitializer :: InitializerState s => s -> Initializer s
- defaultReloadHandler :: MonadSnap m => IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)] -> m ()
- nullReloadHandler :: MonadSnap m => IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)] -> m ()

# Introduction

Snap Extensions is a library which makes it easy to create reusable plugins that extend your Snap application with modular chunks of functionality such as session management, user authentication, templating, or database connection pooling.

We achieve this by requiring that you create a datatype that holds an environment for your application and wrap it around the Snap monad. This new construct becomes your application's handler monad and gives you access to your application state throughout your handlers.

Warning: this interface is still EXPERIMENTAL and has a very high likelihood of changing substantially in coming versions of Snap.

## Using Snap Extensions

Every extension has an interface and at least one implementation of that interface.

For some extensions, like Heist, there is only ever going to be one implementation of the interface. In these cases, both the interface and the implementation are exported from the same module, Snap.Extension.Heist.Impl.

Hypothetically, for something like session management though, there could be multiple implementations, one using a HDBC backend, one using a MongoDB backend and one just using an encrypted cookie as backend. In these cases, the interface is exported from Snap.Extension.Session, and the implementations live in Snap.Extension.Session.HDBC, Snap.Extension.Session.MongoDB and Snap.Extension.Session.CookieStore.

Keeping this in mind, there are a number of things you need to do to use Snap extensions in your application. Let's walk through how to set up a simple application with the Heist extension turned on.

### Define Application State and Monad

First, we define a record type AppState for holding our application's state, including the state needed by the extensions we're using.

At the same time, we also define the monad for our application, App, as a type alias to `SnapExtend AppState`. `SnapExtend` is a `MonadSnap` and a `MonadReader`, whose environment is a given type; in our case, AppState.

    module App where

    import Database.HDBC
    import Database.HDBC.ODBC
    import Snap.Extension
    import Snap.Extension.Heist
    import Snap.Types

    type App = SnapExtend AppState

    data AppState = AppState
        { heistState  :: HeistState App }

An important thing to note is that the -State types that we use in the fields of AppState are specific to each implementation of a extension's interface. That is, Snap.Extension.Session.HDBC will export a different SessionState to Snap.Extension.Session.CookieStore, whose internal representation might be completely different.

This state is what the extension's implementation needs to be able to do its job.

### Provide Instances For "HasState" Classes

Now we have a datatype that contains all the internal state needed by our application and the extensions it uses. That's a great start! But when do we actually get to use this interface and all the functionality that these extensions export? What is actually being extended?

We use the interface provided by an extension inside our application's monad, App. Snap extensions extend our App with new functionality by allowing us to user their exported functions inside of our handlers. For example, the Heist extension provides the function:

`render :: MonadHeist m => ByteString -> m ()` that renders a template by its name.

Is App a `MonadHeist`? Well, not quite yet. Any `MonadReader` which is also a `MonadSnap` whose environment contains a `HeistState` is a `MonadHeist`. That sounds a lot like our App, doesn't it? We just have to tell the Heist extension how to find the `HeistState` in our AppState:

    instance HasHeistState AppState where
        getHeistState = heistState
        setHeistState hs as = as { heistState = hs }

Stated another way, if we give our AppState the ability to hold a HeistState and let the HasHeistState typeclass know how to get/set this state, we are automagically given the ability to render heist templates in our handlers.

With these instances, our application's monad App is now a MonadHeist giving it access to operations like:

    render :: MonadHeist m => ByteString -> m ()

and

    heistLocal :: (TemplateState n -> TemplateState n) -> m a -> m a

### Define The Initializer

So, our monad is now a `MonadHeist`, but how do we actually construct our AppState and turn an App () into a `Snap` ()? We need to do this upfront, once and right before our web server starts listening for connections.

Snap extensions have a thing called an `Initializer` that does these things. Each implementation of a Snap extension interface provides an `Initializer` for its -State type. We must construct an initializer type for our -State type, AppState. An `Initializer` monad is provided in this library to make it easy to do this. For your convenience, `Initializer` is an instance of `MonadIO`.

    appInitializer :: Initializer AppState
    appInitializer = do
        hs <- heistInitializer "resources/templates"
        return $ AppState hs

In addition to constructing the AppState, the Initializer monad also constructs the init, destroy and reload functions for our application from the init, reload and destroy functions for the extensions.

Although it won't cause a compile-time error, it is important to get the order of the initializers correct as much as possible, otherwise they may be reloaded and destroyed in the wrong order. The right order is an order where every extension's dependencies are initialised before that extension. For example, Snap.Extension.Session.HDBC would depend on something which would extend the monad with MonadConnectionPool, i.e., Snap.Extension.ConnectionPool. If you had this configuration it would be important that you put the connectionPoolInitializer before the sessionInitializer in your appInitializer.

This Initializer AppState can then be passed to `runInitializer`, which combines our initializer action with our application's handler to produce a `Snap` handler (which can be passed to `httpServe`), a cleanup action (which you can run after `httpServe` finishes), and a reload action (which, for example, you may want to use in your handler for the path "admin/reload".

The following is an example of how you might use this in main:

    main :: IO ()
    main = do
        (snap,cleanup,reload) <- runInitializer appInitializer appSite
        let site = snap
                   | path admin/reload $ defaultReloadHandler reload cleanup
        quickHttpServe site finally cleanup

You'll notice we're using `defaultReloadHandler`. This is a function exported by Snap.Extension with the type signature

`MonadSnap m => IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)] -> m ()` It takes the reload action returned by `runInitializer` and returns a `Snap` action which renders a simple page showing how the reload went. To avoid denial of service attacks, the reload handler only works for requests made from the local host.

### Simplified Snap Extension Server

This is, of course, a lot of avoidable boilerplate. Snap extensions framework comes with another module Snap.Extension.Server, which provides an interface mimicking that of Snap.Http.Server. Their function names clash, so if you need to use both of them in the same module, use a qualified import. Using this module, the example above becomes:

    import Snap.Extension.Server

    main :: IO ()
    main = quickHttpServe appRunner site

All it needs is a Initializer AppState and an App () and it is ready to go. You might be wondering what happened to all the reload handler bits we had before: That stuff has been absorbed into the config for the server.

One quick note: `quickHttpServe` doesn't take a config, instead it uses the defaults augmented with any options specified on the command-line. The default reload handler path in this case is admin/reload.

If you wanted to change this to nullReloadHandler, you would do this:

    import Snap.Extension.Server

    main :: IO ()
    main = do
        config <- commandLineConfig emptyConfig
        httpServe (setReloadHandler nullReloadHandler config) appRunner site

This behaves exactly as the above example apart from the reload handler.

With this, we now have a fully functional base application that makes use of the Snap Extensions mechanism.

To initialize a directory with all of this setup provided as a starting point, simply `cd` into the desired location and type: `snap init`. An example "Timer" extension will also be included for your convenience.

data SnapExtend s a

A `SnapExtend` is a `MonadReader` and a `MonadSnap` whose environment is the application state for a given progam. You would usually type alias `SnapExtend AppState` to something like `App` to form the monad in which you write your application.

Instances

MonadReader s (SnapExtend s) |
Monad (SnapExtend s) |
Functor (SnapExtend s) |
MonadPlus (SnapExtend s) |
Applicative (SnapExtend s) |
MonadCatchIO (SnapExtend s) |
Alternative (SnapExtend s) |
MonadIO (SnapExtend s) |
MonadSnap (SnapExtend s) |
HasHeistState (SnapExtend s) s => MonadHeist (SnapExtend s) (SnapExtend s) |

data Initializer s

The `Initializer` monad. The code that initialises your application's state is written in the `Initializer` monad. It's used for constructing values which have cleanup/destroy and reload actions associated with them.

Instances

Monad Initializer |
Functor Initializer |
Applicative Initializer |
MonadIO Initializer |

class InitializerState s where

Values of types which are instances of `InitializerState` have cleanup/destroy and reload actions associated with them.

Methods

extensionId :: s -> ByteString

mkCleanup :: s -> IO ()

mkReload :: s -> IO ()

Instances

MonadSnap m => InitializerState (HeistState m) |

runInitializer

Arguments

:: Bool | Verbosity; info is printed to `stderr` when this is `True`
-> Initializer s | The Initializer value
-> SnapExtend s () | A web handler in your application's monad

-> IO (Snap (), IO (), IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)])

Returns a `Snap` handler, a cleanup action, and a reload action. The list returned by the reload action is for error reporting. There is one tuple in the list for each Snap extension; the first element of the tuple is the name of the Snap extension, and the second is a Maybe which contains Nothing if there was no error reloading that extension and a Just with the ByteString containing the error message if there was.

Given the Initializer for your application's state, and a value in the monad formed by `SnapExtend` wrapped it, this returns a `Snap` action, a cleanup action and a reload action.

runInitializerWithReloadAction

Arguments

:: Bool | Verbosity; info is printed to `stderr` when this is `True`
-> Initializer s | The Initializer value
-> SnapExtend s () | A web handler in your application's monad.
-> (IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)] -> SnapExtend s ()) | Your desired "reload" handler; it gets passed the reload action. This handler is always run, so you have to guard the path yourself (with.
-> IO (Snap (), IO ()) | Your `Snap` handler and a cleanup action.

Serves the same purpose as `runInitializer`, but combines the application's web handler with a user-supplied action to be run to reload the application's state.

runInitializerWithoutReloadAction

Arguments

:: Initializer s | The Initializer value
-> SnapExtend s () | An action in your application's monad.
-> IO (Snap (), IO ()) |

A cut-down version of `runInitializer`, for use by the hint loading code

mkInitializer :: InitializerState s => s -> Initializer s

Although it has the same type signature, this is not the same as `return` in the `Initializer` monad. Return simply lifts a value into the `Initializer` monad, but this lifts the value and its destroy/reload actions. Use this when making your own `Initializer` actions.

defaultReloadHandler :: MonadSnap m => IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)] -> m ()

This takes the last value of the tuple returned by `runInitializer`, which is a list representing the results of an attempt to reload the application's Snap Extensions, and turns it into a Snap action which displays the these results.

nullReloadHandler :: MonadSnap m => IO [(ByteString, Maybe ByteString)] -> m ()

Use this reload handler to disable the ability to have a web handler which reloads Snap extensions.