Using a Cassandra Node.js client driver to access Amazon Keyspaces programmatically

This section shows you how to connect to Amazon Keyspaces by using a Node.js client driver. To provide users and applications with credentials for programmatic access to Amazon Keyspaces resources, you can do either of the following:

• Create service-specific credentials that are associated with a specific AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) user.

• For enhanced security, we recommend to create IAM access keys for IAM users or roles that are used across all AWS services. The Amazon Keyspaces SigV4 authentication plugin for Cassandra client drivers enables you to authenticate calls to Amazon Keyspaces using IAM access keys instead of user name and password. For more information, see Create and configure AWS credentials for Amazon Keyspaces.

Before you begin

You need to complete the following task before you can start.

Amazon Keyspaces requires the use of Transport Layer Security (TLS) to help secure connections with clients. To connect to Amazon Keyspaces using TLS, you need to download an Amazon digital certificate and configure the Python driver to use TLS.

Download the Starfield digital certificate using the following command and save sf-class2-root.crt locally or in your home directory.

curl https://certs.secureserver.net/repository/sf-class2-root.crt -O

Note

You can also use the Amazon digital certificate to connect to Amazon Keyspaces and can continue to do so if your client is connecting to Amazon Keyspaces successfully. The Starfield certificate provides additional backwards compatibility for clients using older certificate authorities.

curl https://certs.secureserver.net/repository/sf-class2-root.crt -O

Connect to Amazon Keyspaces using the Node.js DataStax driver for Apache Cassandra and service-specific credentials

Configure your driver to use the Starfield digital certificate for TLS and authenticate using service-specific credentials. For example:

const cassandra = require('cassandra-driver');
const fs = require('fs');
const auth = new cassandra.auth.PlainTextAuthProvider('ServiceUserName', 'ServicePassword');
const sslOptions1 = {
         ca: [
                    fs.readFileSync('path_to_file/sf-class2-root.crt', 'utf-8')],      
                    host: 'cassandra.us-west-2.amazonaws.com',
                    rejectUnauthorized: true
        };
const client = new cassandra.Client({
                   contactPoints: ['cassandra.us-west-2.amazonaws.com'],
                   localDataCenter: 'us-west-2',
                   authProvider: auth,
                   sslOptions: sslOptions1,
                   protocolOptions: { port: 9142 }
        });
const query = 'SELECT * FROM system_schema.keyspaces';
 
client.execute(query)
                    .then( result => console.log('Row from Keyspaces %s', result.rows[0]))
                    .catch( e=> console.log(`${e}`));

Usage notes:

1. Replace "path_to_file/sf-class2-root.crt" with the path to the certificate saved in the first step.

2. Ensure that the ServiceUserName and ServicePassword match the user name and password you obtained when you generated the service-specific credentials by following the steps to Create service-specific credentials for programmatic access to Amazon Keyspaces.

3. For a list of available endpoints, see Service endpoints for Amazon Keyspaces.

Connect to Amazon Keyspaces using the DataStax Node.js driver for Apache Cassandra and the SigV4 authentication plugin

The following section shows how to use the SigV4 authentication plugin for the open-source DataStax Node.js driver for Apache Cassandra to access Amazon Keyspaces (for Apache Cassandra).

If you haven't already done so, create credentials for your IAM user or role following the steps at Create and configure AWS credentials for Amazon Keyspaces.

Add the Node.js SigV4 authentication plugin to your application from the GitHub repository. The plugin supports version 4.x of the DataStax Node.js driver for Cassandra and depends on the AWS SDK for Node.js. It uses AWSCredentialsProvider to obtain credentials.

$ npm install aws-sigv4-auth-cassandra-plugin --save

This code example shows how to set a Region-specific instance of SigV4AuthProvider as the authentication provider.

const cassandra = require('cassandra-driver');
const fs = require('fs');
const sigV4 = require('aws-sigv4-auth-cassandra-plugin');

const auth = new sigV4.SigV4AuthProvider({
    region: 'us-west-2', 
    accessKeyId:'AKIAIOSFODNN7EXAMPLE',
    secretAccessKey: 'wJalrXUtnFEMI/K7MDENG/bPxRfiCYEXAMPLEKEY'});

const sslOptions1 = {
  ca: [
      fs.readFileSync('path_to_filecassandra/sf-class2-root.crt', 'utf-8')],
  host: 'cassandra.us-west-2.amazonaws.com',
  rejectUnauthorized: true
};


const client = new cassandra.Client({
  contactPoints: ['cassandra.us-west-2.amazonaws.com'],
  localDataCenter: 'us-west-2',
  authProvider: auth,
  sslOptions: sslOptions1,
  protocolOptions: { port: 9142 }
});


const query = 'SELECT * FROM system_schema.keyspaces';

client.execute(query).then(
    result => console.log('Row from Keyspaces %s', result.rows[0]))
    .catch( e=> console.log(`${e}`));

Usage notes:

1. Replace "path_to_file/sf-class2-root.crt" with the path to the certificate saved in the first step.

2. Ensure that the accessKeyId and secretAccessKey match the Access Key and Secret Access Key you obtained using AWSCredentialsProvider. For more information, see Setting Credentials in Node.js in the AWS SDK for JavaScript in Node.js.

3. To store access keys outside of code, see best practices at Store access keys for programmatic access.

4. For a list of available endpoints, see Service endpoints for Amazon Keyspaces.