Question

I have currently evaluating Java based security frameworks, I am a Spring 3.0 user so it seemed that SpringSecurity would be the right Choice, but Spring security seems to suffer from excessive complexity, it certainly does not seem like it is making security easier to implement, Shiro seems to be much more coherent and easier to understand. I am looking for lists of pros and cons between these two frameworks.

Answer 1

I too agree that Spring Security feels too complicated (to me). Sure, they have done things to reduce complexity, like creating custom XML namespaces to reduce the quantity of XML configuration, but for me, these don’t address my personal fundamental issue with Spring Security: its names and concepts are often confusing in general to me. It’s hard to just ‘get it’.

The second you start using Shiro though, you just ‘get it’. What was hard to understand in the security world is just that much easier to understand. Things that are unbearably difficult to use in the JDK (e.g. Ciphers) are simplified to a level that is not just bearable, but often a joy to use.

For example, how do you hash+salt a password and base64 encode it in Java or Spring Security? Neither are as simple and intuitive as Shiro’s solution:

ByteSource salt = new SecureRandomNumberGenerator().nextBytes();
new Sha512Hash(password, salt).toBase64();

No need for commons-codec or anything else. Just the Shiro jar.

Now with regards to Spring environments, most of the Shiro developers use Spring as their primary application environment. That means Shiro’s Spring integration is superb and it all works exceptionally well. You can rest assured that if you’re writing a Spring app, you’ll have a well-rounded security experience.

For example, consider the Spring XML config example in another post in this thread. Here’s how you’d do (essentially) the same thing in Shiro:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<beans xmlns="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans http://www.springframework.org/schema/beans/spring-beans.xsd>

<bean id="shiroFilter" class="org.apache.shiro.spring.web.ShiroFilterFactoryBean">
    <property name="securityManager" ref="securityManager"/>
    <property name="loginUrl" value="/login.jsp"/>
    <property name="successUrl" value="/home.jsp"/>
    <property name="unauthorizedUrl" value="/unauthorized.jsp"/>
    <property name="filterChainDefinitions">
        <value>
        /secure/** = authc
        /** = anon
        </value>
    </property>
</bean>

<bean id="securityManager" class="org.apache.shiro.web.mgt.DefaultWebSecurityManager">
    <property name="realm" ref="myRealm"/>
</bean>

<bean id="myRealm" class="...">
    ...
</bean>

Although slightly more verbose than the other Spring example, it is easier to read IMO.

You’ll also find using Shiro’s filter chain definitions are probably the easiest way to define general filter chains and web-based security rules ever! Much nicer than defining them in web.xml.

Finally, Shiro offers extreme ‘pluggability’ as well. You’ll see that you can configure and/or replace just about anything because of Shiro’s POJO/injection-friendly architecture. Shiro defaults almost everything to sane defaults and you can override or configure only what you need.

At the end of the day, I think choosing either of these two is more about your mental model – which of the two make more sense and is more intuitive for you? For some it will be Shiro, for others it will be Spring Security. Shiro works great in Spring environments, so I would say choose based on which of the two you enjoy more and makes the most sense to you.

For more on Shiro’s Spring integration: http://shiro.apache.org/spring.html