0000sir / simple-http-file-server

Simple HTTP file server written in python

Information

This is a simple python HTTP multithreaded server which supports uploads. The following operations are supported:

• GET path/to/file will return the content of path relative to the directory the server was started from.

• GET path/to/dir will return the contents of the directory relative to the directory the server was started from. The contents are returned in json format: a dictionary whose keys define the filenames of childs and the value is the type of the child: either directory, file or other string specifying the type of the member.

• PUT path/to/file will upload a file to the path relative to the directory the server was started from. Any existing directories are automatically created. PUT fails if the given path identifies an existing directory or creating needed directories would overwrite an existing file.

Upload file with this command:

curl -X PUT -T /path/to/your/file -u username:password http://localhost/upload/path

Download your file with:

curl -O -u username:password http://localhost/upload/path/filename.zip

The server supports serving multiple streams concurrently. This is useful if the server will serve many concurrent large streams over slow connection

Usage

Just start the server by command line:

python3 server.py

In case the default number of concurrent connections is not enough, increase the number of listener threads:

python3 server.py --threads=8

The server implements a simple permission system. Users authenticate via HTTP Basic authentication. The permissions are stored in a python file (see below):

python3 server.py --access_config ../perms.json

The server must be put behind a SSL reverse proxy in order to protect credentials and uploaded or downloaded from exposure.

The following shows full list of accepted command line arguments:

usage: server.py [-h] [--access_config ACCESS_CONFIG] [--log_headers]
                 [--log LOG] [--threads THREADS]
                 port

positional arguments:
  port                  The port to listen on

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  --access_config ACCESS_CONFIG
                        Path to access config
  --log_headers         If set logs headers of all requests
  --log LOG             Path to log file
  --threads THREADS     The number of threads to launch

Run In Docker

Config your user and permissions in config/users.json, then run the command:

docker-compose up -d

Permissions

The permissions and user authentication information are specified via a json file. The server expects to be supplied with user and password via HTTP Basic authentication. If HTTP request specifies user and the user is not found in the database or the password does not match, the request always fail. If no authentication information is supplied then the server assumes user "*" as far as permissions are concerned.

Three permissions are supported: "read", "list" and "write" which correspond to "read file", "list directory" and "upload file" operations. Whether a particular operation is supported depends on what permissions are specified for the path in question and its parent paths.

The permissions are determined as follows:

• if the current path has permissions for the current user, then:
  • "r", "rw", "rl", "rwl" allow read file operation
  • "l", "rl", "wl", "rwl" allow list directory operation
  • "w", "rw", "wl", "rwl" allow upload operation
  • "" allows neither
• otherwise, if the current path has permissions for the user "*", then
  • "r", "rw", "rl", "rwl" allow read file operation
  • "l", "rl", "wl", "rwl" allow list directory operation
  • "w", "rw", "wl", "rwl" allow upload operation
  • "" allows neither
• otherwise, the permissions set for the parent path determines whether the operation is allowed.

Note in particular, that permissions set for a different user, except *, are ignored. By default the user "*" has no permissions.

The format of the json file is as follows:

{
    "paths" : [
        { "path" : "<path-to-file-or-dir>",
          "user" : "<user>",
          "perms" : "<permissions>
        },
        <...>
    ],
    "users" : [
        { "user" : "<user>",
          "psw" : "<passphrase>"
        },
        <...>
    ]
}

• <path-to-file specifies path relative to the server start directory to apply permissions for. . specifies the server root (the start directory itself).

• <user> specifies the name of the user. All users used in the paths section must be listed in the users section. Listing the default user * is optional.

• <permissions> a combination of r, w and l characters specifying the permissions.

• <passphrase> the passphrase of the user. Pick a complex passphrase if the server is exposed on the internet because no measures against bruteforcing are implemented.

An example permission file:

{
    "paths" : [
        { "path" : ".", "user" : "*", "perms" : "r" },
        { "path" : "test", "user" : "testuser", "perms" : "w" }
    ],
    "users" : [
        { "user" : "testuser", "psw" : "testpass" }
    ]
}

License

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program. If not, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.