SE Linux is a feature of the Linux kernel that provides mandatory access control. This policy based access control system grants far greater control over the resources on a machine than standard Linux access controls such as permissions.

Many modern Linux distributions are shipping with SELinux enabled by default, Fedora 14 and Rhel 6 both install with it enabled.

When you run Recital Web on a SELinux enabled machine and navigate to the default.rsp page you will see something similar to the screen shot below.


If you launch the SELinux troubleshooter you will see the following problem.

SELinux is blocking the apache server from accessing the Recital server running on port 8001.


To manage you SELinux policy you must have the policycoreutils package group installed. The policycoreutils contains the policy core utilities that are required for basic operation of a SELinux system.

If you wish to use a GUI tool, you must install the policycoreutils-gui package.

At the command prompt execute the following:

As root

$ yum install policycoreutils

$ semanage port -a -t http_port_t -p tcp 8001

$ service recital restart

$ service httpd restart 
 

We use the semanage command here to allow the http server access to port 8001. Once you have completed the steps detailed above you can go and navigate back to the default.rsp page in your borwser, where you will find the permission denied message is now replaced by the default.rsp page.



SELinux does a great job of restricting services and daemons so rather than simply disabling it, why not work with it!

When it comes to security, every little bit helps...

Add this directive to your /etc/httpd/httpd.conf file and restart apache.

DirectoryIndex default.rsp index.html 

Recital 10 introduced the REQUIRE() and REQUIRE_ONCE() statement.

The REQUIRE() statement includes and executes the contents of the specified file at the current program execution level.

When a file is included, the code it contains inherits the variable scope of the line on which the include occurs. Any variables, procedures, functions or classes declared in the included file will be available at the current program execution level.

The REQUIRE_ONCE() statement is identical to the REQUIRE() statement except that Recital will check to see if the file as already been included and if so ignore the command.

The full syntax is:

REQUIRE( expC )
REQUIRE_ONCE( expC )

e.g.

REQUIRE_ONCE( "myapp/myglobals.prg" )

In this article Barry Mavin, CEO and Chief Software Architect for Recital, details Working with Stored Procedures in the Recital Database Server.

Overview

Stored procedures and user-defined functions are collections of SQL statements and optional control-of-flow statements written in the Recital 4GL (compatible with VFP) stored under a name and saved in a Database. Both stored procedures and user-defined functions are just-in-time compiled by the Recital database engine. Using the Database Administrator in Recital Enterprise Studio, you can easily create, view, modify, and test Stored Procedures, Triggers, and user-defined functions

Creating and Editing Stored Procedures

To create a new Stored Procedure,  right-click the Procedures node in the Databases tree of the Project Explorer and choose Create. To modify an existing stored procedure select the Stored Procedure in the Databases Tree in the Project Explorer by double-clicking on it or selecting Modify from the context menu . By convertion we recommend that you name your Stored Procedures beginning with "sp_xxx_", user-defined functions with "f_xxx_", and Triggers with "dt_xxx_", where xxx is the name of the table that they are associated with.

Testing the Procedure

To test run the Stored Procedure, select the Stored Procedure in the Databases Tree in the Project Explorer by double-clicking on it. Once the Database Administrator is displayed, click the Run button to run the procedure.

Getting return values

Example Stored Procedure called "sp_myproc":

parameter arg1, arg2
return arg1 + arg2

Example calling the Stored Procedure from C# .NET:

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// include the references below
using System.Data;
using Recital.Data;

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// sample code to call a Stored Procedure that adds to numeric values together
public int CallStoredProcedure()
{
	RecitalConnection conn = new 
		RecitalConnection("Data Source=localhost;Database=southwind;uid=?;pwd=?");
	RecitalCommand cmd = new RecitalCommand();
	cmd.Connection = conn;
	cmd.CommandText = "sp_myproc(@arg1, @arg2)";
	cmd.CommandType = CommandType.StoredProcedure;
	cmd.Parameters["@arg1"].Value = 10;
	cmd.Parameters["@arg2"].Value = 20;
	conn.Open();
	cmd.ExecuteNonQuery();
	int result = (int)(cmd.Parameters["retvalue"].Value);    // get the return value from the sp
	conn.Close();
	return result;
	}

Writing Stored Procedures that return a Resultset

If you want to write a Stored Procedure that returns a ResultSet, you use the SETRESULTSET() function of the 4GL. Using the Universal .NET Data Provider, you can then execute the 4GL Stored Procedure and return the ResultSet to the client application for processing. ResultSets that are returned from Stored Procedures are read-only.

Example Stored Procedure called "sp_myproc":

parameter query
select * from customers &query into cursor "mydata"
return setresultset("mydata")

Example calling the Stored Procedure from C# .NET:

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// include the references below
using System.Data;
using Recital.Data;

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// sample code to call a stored procedure that returns a ResultSet
public void CallStoredProcedure()
{
	RecitalConnection conn = new 
		RecitalConnection("Data Source=localhost;Database=southwind;uid=?;pwd=?");
	RecitalCommand cmd = new RecitalCommand();
	cmd.Connection = conn;
	cmd.CommandText = "sp_myproc(@query)";
	cmd.CommandType = CommandType.StoredProcedure;
	cmd.Parameters["@query"].Value = "where not deleted()";
	conn.Open();
	RecitalDataReader dreader = cmd.ExecuteReader();
	int sqlcnt = (int)(cmd.Parameters["sqlcnt"].Value);    // returns number of affected rows
	while (dreader.Read())
	{
		// read and process the data
	}
	dreader.Close();
	conn.Close();
}