How long will RDP Refresh Token be expired?

Tony.Zhu_R
Tony.Zhu_R
in Refinitiv Data Platform

As asked in the subject, can you advise when there is a need to re-send the request for a new Refresh Token before the previous one is expired? The post states that Access Token is expired in 5 mins but doesn't mention that of Refresh Token.

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Best Answer

  • umer.nalla
    umer.nalla
    Answer ✓

    Hi @updated already

    A few points of clarification.

    There are two types of credential a user may use to access RDP APIs + data

    A username is designed for display type usage only (e.g. for testing with the RDP API Playground) and will therefore expire within 18hrs and only allow a single connection at a time. It must not be used for programmatic access to RDP data.

    A MachineID is for programmatic access to RDP data and a correctly configured one should never expire under normal circumstances and it should also allow 5 concurrent connections.

    If a MachineID is expiring on a regular basis then this means the MachineID was incorrectly configured and needs to be recreated.

    Having said all the above, a MachineID may occasionally expire due to various exceptional circumstances. Therefore, a robust application should be coded defensively to handle this possibility. Both the above techniques that myself and my colleague Gurpreet mention should be included in a robust application i.e. using a password grant login to obtain a new Refresh token when:

    • receiving a response status code of 400 or 401
    • expires_in key in the Refresh Grant response is not equal to the original expires_in key

    I hope this clarifies the position on Refresh Token expiry


Answers

  • umer.nalla
    umer.nalla

    Hi @updated already

    Whilst I cannot confirm how long a Refresh Token lasts, the various RDP Websocket API examples (Python, C# and Java) demonstrate that when you are trying to get a new Access Token; if you get error 400 or 401 - but you already have an existing RefreshToken - then you should log in again using username and password etc to get new Refresh Token

    e.g. Python snippet:

    def get_sts_token(current_refresh_token, url=None): 
    .... 
        elif r.status_code == 400 or r.status_code == 401:
            # Retry with username and password
            print('EDP-GW authentication HTTP code:', r.status_code, r.reason)
            if current_refresh_token:
                # Refresh token may have expired. Try using our password.
                print('Retry with username and password')
                return get_sts_token(None)
    ....


    where r is the response from the requests.post call

    Any developer writing an application that uses OAuth2 with Refresh and Access tokens should implement the above functionality - rather than hardcoding any particular value for getting a new Refresh Token


  • Gurpreet
    Gurpreet

    Hi @updated already,

    The refresh tokens typically last 18 hours.

    When your application detects that the expires_in key in the Refresh Grant response is not equal to the original expires_in key, this implies that your refresh token has expired and the application should use Password Grant to continue.

  • Tony.Zhu_R
    Tony.Zhu_R

    Thanks, @Gurpreet. May I know what's 'Refresh Grant Response' you referred to? By calling Token service endpoint https://api.refinitiv.com/auth/oauth2/v1/token, the value of key 'expires_in' in the response is for Access_Token only, right? I didn't see Refresh_Token value changes through a series of calls during an hour.

  • Gurpreet
    Gurpreet

    See the expire_time usage in this sample code - https://github.com/Refinitiv/websocket-api/blob/master/Applications/Examples/RDP/python/market_price_edpgw_service_discovery.py

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