Category Archives: Dradis_Pro

Posts about features, announcements and updates of Dradis Professional Edition.

A Year of Updates [2023] – Dradis Pro

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Dradis exists to give pentesting teams more time to do what they do best, cutting the busywork from cybersecurity projects by automating pentest reporting and streamlining collaboration.

To achieve this, we’re continually improving the product. Fixing bugs and adding/improving features. 

2023 was a busy year at Dradis, with dozens of bugs fixed, and a bunch of new and improved features.

Improved reporting and testing features

  • Inline code support
  • Adding liquid content to Word and HTML reports
  • Improved filters in Word templates
  • Mappings Manager available for Azure DevOps and Jira 
  • Quality assurance 
  • Custom tag management

Improved admin and support features

  • Archiving projects – rather than moving them into the trash
  • Opt-in usage analytics 
  • Improved administrator powers

Improved reporting and testing features

Inline Code Support

v4.7

We already supported code blocks, but now, you can use @ symbols to create in-line code inside of your Dradis project:

Screenshot of the Dradis Pro inline code support feature update

When you export this to a Word report that has a custom InlineCode character style, you’ll get that code styled automatically:

Screenshot of the inline code output in Dradis Pro

Liquid Dynamic Content in Word and HTML reports

v.4.9

We have already supported Liquid content in Dradis Gateway templates for a while – now we are bringing Liquid Dynamic Content to Word and HTML reports as well.

Want to refer to document properties like dradis.client inside a ContentBlock? Want to show the count of evidence inside the text of an Issue? Want to use conditionals like “If this property is in Spanish, export this issue in Spanish instead of English”? Now you can!

Better filters in Word templates

v.4.9

We now have two more filtering options available in Word: Filters with spaces, and filters on Nodes.

Filtering with spaces means you can use double quotes in both field names and filter values. For example, you can filter by “CVSS Base"|(9.0..10.0) or Category|"A1 Injection“.

Nodes can be filtered by Node Properties. For example, if you have a Node property for type with values of internal/external, you can filter a Node by type|internal to only see content for internal-type Nodes.

Mappings Manager for Azure DevOps and Jira

v4.10

What was previously the Plugin Manager is now the Mappings Manager as we’ve extended the functionality to Azure DevOps and Jira. You told us that you usually have a pattern for the data that you send to these external tools. For example, you’d want a specific set of fields from your Dradis issue to go into your Jira card’s description.

Screenshot of the Mappings Manager for Azure DevOps and Jira in Dradis pro

The Mappings Manager allows you to configure that mapping so that the next time you send an Issue to Azure DevOps or Jira, the editor will pre-populate with the data from your Issue in the exact format you specified. You’ll still have the ability to edit it before sending the Issue to Azure DevOps or Jira if needed.

Screenshot of an issue being mapped to Azure DevOps

Quality Assurance

v4.8

Review/approve Issues and Content Blocks before including them in reports.

The goal here was to give you a way to differentiate between “I’ve reviewed this issue” and “I haven’t reviewed this issue yet”.

Screenshot showing how you can review/approve Issues and Content Blocks before including them in pentest reports.

You can use the new QA view to look at your “Ready for review” Issues and Content Blocks and review them before including them in reports.

Dradis v4.8.0 has a Quality Assurance feature to approve Issues and Content Blocks before reporting

Then, on the Export page, the default is to export just the Published records. But, you can also export All if that makes more sense for your team’s workflow.

Dradis Pro Export Manager Screenshot

Custom Tag Management

v4.7

Previously, you could create custom tags by editing the XML of the project template directly. That’s still an option if you happen to enjoy dealing with XML. Otherwise, you can now use the UI for that whole process. There’s even a color picker so that you can get just the right shade for your custom tags.

Screenshot of Custom Tag Management in Dradis Pro

From the project level, you can also manage your tags and create, edit, or delete them as needed:

Screenshot of tags management overview

Improved admin and support features

Archiving projects – rather than moving them into the trash

v4.10

Previously, we had active projects or projects in the Trash and nothing in between. You asked for another way to organize projects and we delivered! Now, you can archive projects as well. Archiving a project does not delete a project, but leaves it in the Archive tab of the Projects view. This way you can maintain an uncluttered view of active projects without needing to send inactive projects to the trash.

Screenshot of managing and archiving projects

Opt-in Usage Analytics

v4.7

Before v4.7, we had no way to receive usage data from your instance other than a ping to our licensing server when you first activate the instance. In v4.7, we have rolled out optional usage analytics that you can share with us. Yes, optional!

For full transparency, you can see exactly what you would be sending to us in the event log. It’s all anonymized data like “someone exported a Word report” or “someone logged in as a contributor” that is designed to help us understand how teams are using Dradis and should not reveal anything sensitive, not even your email address.

Opt in usage analytics screenshot

Of course, you can always opt out of sharing this data with us if you prefer. We’re excited to have a bit more information about how you’re currently using Dradis so that we can make the product even better for everyone in the future.

Tester Administration

v4.8

We’ve also added better in-app tester administration. If a user gets locked out of their account with too many incorrect login attempts, Admin users will now be able to unlock their account with 1 click.

Screenshot of Dradis pro admin manager

v4.11 – the latest release

We’ve continued releasing updates in 2024, here’s an overview of our latest release:

  • Improved version history
  • Fixed liquid dynamic content preview in the editor
  • Fixed export crashing with links with trailing special character
  • Fixed link formatting for hyperlinks in inline code blocks

Check out the full release notes.

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New in Dradis Pro v4.11

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Dradis Framework is a collaboration and reporting tool for information security teams to manage and deliver the results of security assessments, in less time and with less frustration than manual methods.

Bug Fixes

Dradis v4.11.0 is full of bug fixes and technical updates. You may not see brand new features or changes to the UI but we fixed many, many different things behind the scenes. We also updated some behind-the-scenes aspects like the rails version.

Improved version history

We’ve improved the version history and the way that it displays. Previously, the entire line/paragraph would be marked as changed, even if a single word was changed. Check out the new and improved version!

Fixed liquid dynamic content preview in the editor

We’ve also improved the way that Liquid Dynamic Content previews in the editor

Fixed export crashing with links with trailing special character

Previously, exports would crash if you included a link with a trailing special character. No more!

Fixed link formatting for hyperlinks in inline code blocks

We’ve also fixed the formatting of links inside code blocks so that they appear in the report exactly how you’d expect them to appear.

Release Notes

  • Assets: Add importmap-rails to handle js libraries
  • Liquid: Add LiquidAssignsService
  • nginx: Add HTTP/2 support
  • Revision history: Improve version history for content with carriage return
  • Tylium: Show liquid content in editor preview
  • Web-server: Replace unicorn with puma in production
  • Validation: Display attachment validator errors when viewing/editing a record
  • Flash alert: Allow the ‘license about to expire’ alert to be dismissed for the session
  • Upgraded gems:
    • rails, resque-scheduler
  • Bug fixes:
    • Code blocks: Remove extra padding and background for code elements outside of projects
    • Contributors: Expire one time token after login
    • Evidence: Prevent loading old Evidence template content at the Issue level
    • Methodologies: validate presence of content
  • Integration enhancements:
    • Authentication Integrations: Use the AuthenticationStrategies class for Rails 7 support
    • Burp: Fix compatibility with nokogiri >= 1.15
    • Nexpose:
      • Add port/protocol to evidences
      • Use the details in <os> as the OS node property
      • Import `vulnerability.risk_score` as a new Issue field
      • Allow multiple evidence with the same test id & node address
    • Qualys: Add support for the output for Qualys WAS API 3.13 and later
  • Reporting enhancements:
    • Word:
      • Fix export crashing with links with trailing special characters
      • Skip link formatting for hyperlinks in inline code blocks
  • Security Fixes:
    • Low: Authenticated (author) information disclosure
      • After a user has been removed from a project, they may still get notifications for Issues they were subscribed to, resulting in the disclosure of Issue titles.
    • Low: Information Disclosure in the Output Console of Upload Manager

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New in Dradis Pro v4.10

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Dradis Framework is a collaboration and reporting tool for information security teams to manage and deliver the results of security assessments, in less time and with less frustration than manual methods.

Validate your projects before your export

How many times have you gone to export a report and realized later that there was an error that the validator caught, you just didn’t validate first? Now, the validation is built into the exporter so that you’ll always get a heads-up about possible problems and can fix them before exporting the report. In the case of false positive validator warnings, you’ll have the option to bypass the errors and continue with the export.

If there are no validation errors, the export will proceed with no extra clicks necessary!

Mappings Manager for Azure DevOps and Jira

What was previously the Plugin Manager is now the Mappings Manager as we’ve extended the functionality to Azure DevOps and Jira. You told us that you usually have a pattern for the data that you send to these external tools. For example, you’d want a specific set of fields from your Dradis issue to go into your Jira card’s description.

The Mappings Manager allows you to configure that mapping so that the next time you send an Issue to Azure DevOps or Jira, the editor will pre-populate with the data from your Issue in the exact format you specified. You’ll still have the ability to edit it before sending the Issue to Azure DevOps or Jira if needed.

Archiving projects

Previously, we had active projects or projects in the Trash and nothing in between. You asked for another way to organize projects and we delivered! Now, you can archive projects as well. Archiving a project does not delete a project, but leaves it in the Archive tab of the Projects view. This way you can maintain an uncluttered view of active projects without needing to send inactive projects to the trash.

New Methodologies REST API endpoint

You can now access Methodology data including Boards, Lists, and Cards via the REST API.

Release Notes

  • Report Template Properties: Add fields with “String” type by default
  • Tylium: Consolidate sidebars
  • Integration Manager:
    • Add error handling for enabling/disabling and installing incompatible files
    • Add the HTML Exporter to the Tools Manager
  • Plugin Manager: Add support for Liquid content in templates
  • Users: Add support for longer TLDs in user emails
  • Projects: Allow archiving of projects
  • Upgraded gems:
    • font-awesome-sass, nokogiri, puma, rails, sanitize, selenium-webdriver
  • Bug fixes:
    • Activity Feed:
    • Correctly render icons for each activity in the feed
    • Export:
    • Prevent exporting reports when the exporter doesn’t have any templates
    • Exclude blank and n/a values from range filters
    • QA: Enable @mentions and formatting toolbar for comments in QA show views
  • Integration enhancements:
    • Azure DevOps: Implement Mappings Manager for Azure DevOps
    • HTML Export
    • Add to the Tools Manager
    • Fix default templates
    • Prevent exporting reports without any HTML templates
    • JIRA
    • Add support for Liquid when sending issues to JIRA
    • Implement Mappings Manager for JIRA
    • Implement ticket assignment when sending issues to JIRA
    • Fix Author authorization when sending an issue to JIRA
    • Send attachments included in an issue to JIRA
    • WPScan: Import “version” findings with status: outdated
  • Reporting enhancements:
    • Word: Validate project before export
  • REST/JSON API enhancements:
    • Boards, Lists, Cards: add initial implementation
  • Security Fixes:
    • Medium: Authenticated (author) broken access control: read access to system files

Not using Dradis Pro?

Dradis v4.8.0 has a Quality Assurance feature to approve Issues and Content Blocks before reporting

New in Dradis Pro v4.9

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Dradis Framework is a collaboration and reporting tool for information security teams to manage and deliver the results of security assessments, in less time and with less frustration than manual methods.

Liquid Dynamic Content in Word and HTML reports

We have already supported Liquid content in Dradis Gateway templates for a while – now we are bringing Liquid Dynamic Content to Word and HTML reports as well.

Want to refer to document properties like dradis.client inside a ContentBlock? Want to show the count of evidence inside the text of an Issue? Want to use conditionals like “If this property is in Spanish, export this issue in Spanish instead of English”? Now you can! For example, the following will export into an Issue:

#[Description]#
Global:
{{ project.name }} for {{ team.name }} team
{{document_properties.available_properties}}
 
Tag Name:
{% for tag in issue.tags %} {{ tag.name}} {%endfor%}
 
CVSSv3 score:
{{ issue.fields['CVSSv3.BaseScore'] }}
 
Evidence:
{% for evidence in issue.evidence %} {{ evidence.fields["Label"] }} {%endfor%}
 
The {{ issue.title }} issue has {{ issue.evidence.size }} instances of Evidence
 
Evidence count per node:
{% for node in issue.affected %}
{{ node.label}} has {{node.evidence.size}} instances of evidence
{% endfor %}

It would give a result like the following:

Better filters in Word templates

We now have two more filtering options available in Word: Filters with spaces, and filters on Nodes.

Filtering with spaces means you can use double quotes in both field names and filter values. For example, you can filter by "CVSS Base"|(9.0..10.0) or Category|"A1 Injection".

Nodes can be filtered by Node Properties. For example, if you have a Node property for type with values of internal/external, you can filter a Node by type|internal to only see content for internal-type Nodes.

DuoWeb and ServiceNow support in the Integration Manager

We have changed the way our integrations work, so you can now install DuoWeb and ServiceNow right in the Integration Manager. No need to use the command line to install 2FA! You can also configure Duo and ServiceNow, as well as integrations like Azure DevOps, right in the Integration Manager.

Release Notes

  • AccessTokens: allow the storage of per-user encrypted tokens
  • QA: Show state changes in activity feed
  • Sessions: Store :secret_key_base in encrypted configuration file
  • Tylium: Extend support for Liquid Dynamic Content
  • Upgraded gems:
    • bootstrap, popper_js, simple_form
  • Bugs fixes:
    • Issue Library: Prevent rendering navbar over top of the fullscreen editor
    • QA: Redirect to correct view when changing states on QA edit views
    • Users: Force logout for users with locked accounts
  • Integration enhancements:
    • Acunetix: Parse inline code, not just code blocks
    • Burp: Adds strong and code tags parsing
    • CSV: Fix CSV Upload for files with special characters
    • Nessus:
      • Parse code tags as inline code
      • Add plugin_type as an available Issue field
    • Nexpose:
      • Parse inline code, not just code blocks
      • Wrap ciphers in the ssl-weak-message-authentication-code-algorithms finding
    • Qualys: Adds Request/Response Evidence fields for Web Application Scans (WAS)
    • Azure DevOps: Switch authentication from PAT to OAuth2
    • Duo 2FA:
      • Migrate to UI-based configuration
      • Add to Integrations Manager
    • ServiceNow:
      • Migrate to UI-based configuration
      • Add to Integrations Manager
  • Reporting enhancements:
    • Word
      • Add support for filtering nodes by properties
      • Add support for the notextile tag
      • Allow multi-word fields/values in the content control filters with double quotes
      • Extend support for liquid dynamic content in Word reports
      • Warn of missing blank lines around a screenshot only when it’s not the first or last item in a field

Not using Dradis Pro?

Dradis v4.8.0 has a Quality Assurance feature to approve Issues and Content Blocks before reporting

New in Dradis Pro v4.8

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Dradis Framework is a collaboration and reporting tool for information security teams to manage and deliver the results of security assessments, in less time and with less frustration than manual methods.

Quality Assurance

Review/approve Issues and Content Blocks before including them in reports.

The goal here was to give you a way to differentiate between “I’ve reviewed this issue” and “I haven’t reviewed this issue yet”.

You can use the new QA view to look at your “Ready for review” Issues and Content Blocks and review them before including them in reports.

Then, on the Export page, the default is to export just the Published records. But, you can also export All if that makes more sense for your team’s workflow.

Tester Administration

We’ve also added better in-app tester administration. If a user gets locked out of their account with too many incorrect login attempts, Admin users will now be able to unlock their account with 1 click.

Release Notes

  • Quality Assurance: Review/approve Issues and Content Blocks before including them in reports
  • Tester Administration: Add unlock button to UI for locked Testers
  • Integration enhancements:
    • JIRA: Add support for Jira Data Center v8.4+
  • Upgraded gems:
    • rack, rails, time
  • Bug fixes:
    • Kits: Enable import of kit with no project template
  • Security Fixes:
    • Medium: Authenticated (author) persistent cross-site scripting

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New in Dradis Pro v4.7

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Dradis Framework is a collaboration and reporting tool for information security teams to manage and deliver the results of security assessments, in less time and with less frustration than manual methods.

Inline Code Support

We already supported code blocks, but now, you can use @ symbols to create in-line code inside of your Dradis project:

When you export this to a Word report that has a custom InlineCode character style, you’ll get that code styled automatically:

Custom Tag Management

Previously, you could create custom tags by editing the XML of the project template directly. That’s still an option if you happen to enjoy dealing with XML. Otherwise, you can now use the UI for that whole process. There’s even a color picker so that you can get just the right shade for your custom tags.

From the project level, you can also manage your tags and create, edit, or delete them as needed:

Opt-in Usage Analytics

Prior to v4.7, we had no way to receive usage data from your instance other than a ping to our licensing server when you first activate the instance. In v4.7, we have rolled out optional usage analytics that you can share with us. Yes, optional!

For full transparency, you can see exactly what you would be sending to us in the event log. It’s all anonymized data like “someone exported a Word report” or “someone logged in as a contributor” that is designed to help us understand how teams are using Dradis and should not reveal anything sensitive, not even your email address.

Of course, you can always opt out of sharing this data with us if you prefer. We’re excited to have a bit more information about how you’re currently using Dradis so that we can make the product even better for everyone in the future.

Release Notes

  • Configurations: Add usage tracking and sharing
  • Content Blocks:
    • Add auto-caching
    • Add image upload button to source view toolbar
  • Issues: Display the results from importers in a Datatable
  • Rubocop CI:
    • disable EnforcedShorthandSyntax rule under Style/HashSyntax cop
  • Tylium:
    • Add breadcrumbs to Revision History view
    • Add secondary sidebar toggling functionality
    • Remove Recent Activity tabs and add View History link to the dots menu
    • Tags: Add tag management
  • Nginx:
    • Remove support for TLSv1.0 and TLSv1.1
    • Add support for TLSv1.3
  • Integration enhancements:
    • Burp: Add support for large base64 response
    • Nessus: Clean up code tags in description fields
    • Netsparker: Add issue.classification_owasp2021 as a new avaiable field
    • JIRA: Fix configurations page requiring JIRA token
    • Remediation Tracker
    • Add a sidebar with a back link and info pane for contributors
    • Hide ticket actions from other addons for contributors
    • SAML: Fix assets on login for some providers
  • Upgraded gems:
    • nokogiri, rails, rails-html-sanitizer, sanitize, sinatra
  • Bug fixes:
    • Business Intelligence: Prevent tracking of discarded projects/teams in dashboard
    • Issues: Prevent multiple action cable subscriptions when going back to the issues table
    • Project: Pre-select the project template when project creation fails
    • Methodologies: Ensure params are validated when moving list/card
    • Issuelib: Avoid partial matches being found when importing tool output
  • Reporting enhancements:
    • Word:
      • Add support for inline code
      • Ignore character properties inside Code paragraphs
      • Use ‘DradisData’ as sheet name for embedded chars
  • REST/JSON API enhancements:
    • Author: Add author field for content blocks, notes, issues, and evidence

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New in Dradis Pro v4.6

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Dradis Framework is a collaboration and reporting tool for information security teams to manage and deliver the results of security assessments, in less time and with less frustration than manual methods.

Integration and Tool Manager

Now you can install and upgrade integrations (such as DuoWeb and Jira) and tools (such as the Gateway and the Remediation Tracker) directly in the Dradis application – no need to use ssh or the command line! Simply browse to the Integration and Tool Manager in Dradis v4.6, Get the tool, and then Enable it. Then you should be good to go!

Instance Dashboard

Want a better overview of what is going on in your Dradis instance after login? The new Instance Dashboard gives you an at-a-glance overview of Projects, Tickets, and Tasks assigned to you; a list of the newest unread notifications; and and overview of what’s new in the latest version of Dradis.

As a new feature, please do let us know if there are other things you would like to see or change on the instance dashboard once you start using it.

Permanently delete items in Trash

As of v4.2 of Dradis, you could soft-delete projects and teams so they end up in an Instance Trash. However, to permanently delete items in trash, you needed to use the command line. Not anymore! Now you can permanently delete items in Trash straight from the UI.

New Kits

We have long had a few templates and kits available for download at the Dradis Users Portal. We have overhauled some of these kits and made them available directly from the Dradis UI. Simply go to Templates –> Kit Upload, and either upload a kit file as you normally would, or click the Upload button under your preferred preinstalled testing kit.

Release Notes

  • Dashboard: See active projects, notifications, assignments, and what’s new in one view
  • Integration and Tool Manager: Add UI for installing and managing integrations
  • Kits:
    • Add selection of kits to choose from
    • Enable import of kit with no templates
  • Mintcreek: Adjust element contrast ratios to be WCAG 2.1 compliant
  • Navbar:
    • Split the Addons menu into Integrations and Tools menus
    • Remove inaccessible addon’s menu items for contributors
  • Notes: Remove category selection from form UI
  • Projects: Update active projects empty state
  • Trash: Delete projects and teams permanently
  • Rubocop: lint changed files since previous commit
  • Upgraded gems:
    • nokogiri
  • Bugs fixes:
    • Comments: Align comment header content in Safari
    • Content Blocks: Fix revision history links
  • New integrations:
    • Core Impact
    • Veracode
  • Integration enhancements:
    • Implement enable/disable feature for Gateway, JIRA, Remediation Tracker, Scheduler, and VSTS
    • JIRA:
      • Add view for editing configuration
      • Hide link in addons menu for contributors
    • VSTS:
      • Add view for editing configuration
      • Issues: add WorkItem Status and Comment feed
  • REST/JSON API: new v2 released
    • Projects: undiscard and permanently delete from trash.
    • Teams:
      • Undiscard and permanently delete from trash.
      • Deprecate the “/clients” endpoint, use “/teams”
      • Deprecate the “client_since” attribute, use “team_since”

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Dradis Framework is a collaboration and reporting tool for information security teams to manage and deliver the results of security assessments, in less time and with less frustration than manual methods.

CSV Importer

Dradis can now import CSV files into projects! Some vulnerability scanners produce output in CSV format rather than e.g. XML or JSON. You can now import these (and other) CSV files into Dradis, and configure which column to assign to which field in your Dradis projects on a per-file basis. Simply go to “Upload”, select the CSV importer, upload a file, and you will be redirected to an interface to assign data to fields. As with other plugins, you can create Issue, Evidence, or Node data and fields.

This is v1 of the CSV importer, so we look forward to your feedback on what works for you and what you would like to see in the future from this feature!

Note that for the sake of internal naming consistency, we have renamed the CSV exporter plugin with this change, so if you have the CSV exporter installed, you will need to reinstall the plugin as dradis-csv_export.

JIRA bulk send

Do you use our JIRA integration? If so, you can now bulk-send issues to JIRA. Simply select multiple issues from your project in the “All Issues” view, and click “Send to JIRA”:

That will send all your selected issues to the Dradis-JIRA interface. Pick the destination project, issue type, and other required fields for each item, and you’re done!

Bug fixes and quality-of-life improvements

Another focus of the v4.5 release is working through some bug reports and lower-level requests we have accumulated over time.

Bug fixes include multiple items relating to attachment validation and export, Node labels linking to external resources (so e.g. clicking on a Node label of “www.google.com” will no longer redirect you to Google instead of the Node in Dradis), and the Rules Engine matching against IssueLibrary entries without trailing empty lines.

Quality-of-life improvements include adding Revision History for Content Blocks and improved error messages in the Output Console on Word report export. Check our release notes for more detail!

Release Notes

  • Content Blocks: implement Revision History
  • Upgraded Dradis Pro to run on ruby 3.1.2
  • Upgraded gems:acts_as_tree, bootsnap, bundler-audit, factory_bot, paper_trail, rails, rails-html-sanitizer, timecop, thor, unicorn, unicorn-worker-killer
  • Bug fixes:
    • Attachments: Fix attachments not showing, validating, or exporting correctly
    • Evidence:
      • Add validation for creating evidences in the issue view
      • Set correct localStorage key to prevent pre-populating incorrect content at the issue level
    • Issue Library: Render colored badges in the Tags column of the entries table
    • Nodes: Prevent evidence labels linking to external resources
    • Rules Engine: Fix the Rules Engine not matching Issue Library entries with no trailing empty lines
  • New integrations:
    • CSV Importer
  • Integration enhancements:
    • JIRA:
      • Add support for datepicker custom fields
      • Add Bulk Send To support
      • Update JIRA setup instructions
    • Rules Engine: Prevent subsequent rules from running after a discard action
    • Qualys: Wrap ciphers in code blocks for the Vuln Importer
  • Reporting enhancements:
    • CSV Export: Rename integration to dradis-csv_export
    • HTML Export: Add :rtp plugins feature
    • Word:
      • Fixes “-” in hyperlinks displaying HTML entity
      • Fixes duplicated relationship Ids when adding relationships
      • Fixes text with double exclamation marks breaking report
      • Show error message in export logs when populating multi-paragraph content in inline content controls
      • Show error message in export logs when removing invalid screenshots
  • Security Fixes:
    • Medium: Authenticated author broken access control: read access to issue content

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Dradis Framework is a collaboration and reporting tool for information security teams to manage and deliver the results of security assessments, in less time and with less frustration than manual methods.

Plugin Manager Validation

The Plugin Manager has new validation! Previously, you’d need a file like issue.txt to use when configuring the Plugin Manager. Now, you can simply associate the Plugin Manager with one of the report templates on your Dradis instance. You’ll see a validation check on the right that will tell you about any missing fields as you configure.

Rules Engine Population

Remember that after a tool file is uploaded, the data runs through the Plugin Manager, then hits the Rules Engine. So, we’ve also updated the Rules Engine so that when you build out new Rules, the Match Field trigger is populated with a dropdown of fields that matches what you configured in the Plugin Manager. No more double-checking field names, capitalization, or anything else like that.

Duplicate a Project

Want to start over with a copy of one of your existing projects? Previously, we had the project import/export feature that would work for this but the new Duplicate button streamlines the process significantly. For retests or just starting over with a copy of a project, just hit the Duplicate button and a new project will be automatically created that is identical to the old one.

Bulk Update Issues and Evidence fields

Have you ever run into a situation where you wished that you could edit multiple Issues or instances of Evidence at once? You can now! Just select multiple Issues or instances of Evidence:

Release Notes

  • Login View: Design update
  • Plugin Manager: Add ability to validate plugin templates with report templates
  • Projects: Add ability to clone projects
  • Tylium:
    • Implement bulk updating for issues/evidence fields
    • Improve mobile experience
    • Show the resource title in the header when viewing a resource
  • Upgraded gems:
    • nokogiri, rack, sinatra
  • Bugs fixes:
    • Cards: Prevent adding ‘card’ class to card comments
    • Login: Add button styles for 3rd party login addons
  • Integration enhancements:
    • Rules Engine: Matching fields are now based on the fields defined in the Plugin Manager
  • Reporting enhancements:
    • Word: Assign unique Word IDs to each element in the document.

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The Plugin Manager is not so scary anymore!

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So you’ve been using Dradis for a while (or maybe you’re a new user — welcome to the community 👋), and you’ve been avoiding the Plugin Manager because it’s been a little intimidating. Its purpose may not have been clear, and the relationship between the Plugin Manager, uploading files, the Rules Engine, and what ends up in a project may have been fuzzy. You uploaded some scanner results, dove into your project, and realized things didn’t appear as expected. Now you’re clicking around trying to figure out what went wrong. Sounds familiar? We’ll admit the Plugin Manager caused some confusion, but you’re in for a treat with Dradis Pro v4.4.0!

We took action to smooth out the friction

Since most of the mystery and confusion seems to be around how changes in the Plugin Manager affect projects and reports, we decided to add a way for users to validate their Plugin Manager configurations. This validation happens on a per-tool basis against any report template uploaded to Dradis. Let’s dive into some of the changes we made and the thought process behind some of those changes.

Improvements to the user interface

Before building out this new feature, we had to figure out where it would live. While deciding on that, we also determined it would be a great time to tidy up the Plugin Manager layout.

When users first landed on the Plugin Manager view, we presented them with some explainer text and an example of how tool output translates to a Dradis note. This wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t exactly super helpful or welcoming.

Some of the issues we identified and set out to improve here were:

  1. Parts of the copy were confusing
  2. The example section wasn’t clear to first-time users
  3. Users didn’t have a sense of direction (what do they need to do next?)
  4. The plugins menu was not labelled or explained (users had to explore by clicking)
  5. The layout wasn’t very consistent with other views in the app

We decided to shuffle the layout around a little to tackle these points and make it more consistent with other views. Most of our views have a page title, the main content area and a sidebar, so we wanted to implement that here as well. Here is an early mock-up with some changes added with a fat marker (Title, subheading, section headers, and a sidebar with some tips).

Overall, the plan was to:

  1. update the copy and move it to a tips panel in the sidebar
  2. change the example section to a vertical layout with some arrows added to show the flow of stages in the process
  3. update the headings of the three stages in the example section to make them clear
  4. add a header to the plugins menu 
  5. add some copy (not pictured above) to direct the user to select a plugin from the menu on the left

These changes would bring consistency to the view, enable the user to quickly understand the relation of the three stages in the example, and give the user some direction as to what to do next. This design addresses all five issues we wanted to improve, so we started implementing these changes, and this is the new view as a result:

Addition of Plugin Manager Validation 

So far, the above changes are fine and dandy, but they still don’t help users bridge the gap between what they expect in their projects and what they get. This is where the shiny new validation feature comes in.

The idea was to allow users to edit their plugin manager configurations and show them how it will jive with their report template of choice. The validation feature would work by having users select a plugin and a report template. It would show which fields are mapped correctly and which fields are missing. We had internal discussions about the best approach and where we could incorporate validation into the Plugin Manager. Initially, we thought about adding the validation section to the main Plugin Manager view, but we quickly decided against that and thought about a new view dedicated to this new validation feature:

This is the first look at the validation feature design and components. We’ll get into the details a little farther down, but the overall idea is that users select a plugin, select a report template, and they see what’s mapped correctly and what’s not.

This view would show all things related to the validation of the selected plugin, and at first, it seemed like it would work in terms of layout. The view would be consistent with other related views, it would give users all the validation functionality, and it would allow users to edit the plugin’s configuration. However, after further design work and discussing with the team, we realized this implementation would be pretty annoying for users. It would require users to make an edit, come to this validation view, check their validation, realize they need to make further edits, go back to editing, then come back here to re-check their validation… you get the idea, way too much clicking around to get one thing done so back to the drawing board.

Rather than making users navigate away from the validation view to make the edits to the configuration, we figured why not bring the validation feature to the edit view? Another upside of having validation added to the edit view is that we would eliminate the need for users to select which plugin they want to validate. Here is a screenshot of the current edit view for reference:

It’d be pretty crowded if we just dropped that validation section into this view, so we knew we had to make further refinements to the design. 

We also had to consider cases where there could be multiple exporters for the selected plugin (i.e. Qualys has Asset, Vuln, and WAS), and each of those exporters could have templates that map to Issues, Evidence, or Notes in Dradis Projects. It can be a bit of a guessing game to know which template maps to issues, notes, or evidence. Here is an example:

The image above shows that Nessus has Report host, Report item, and Evidence templates. Users can guess that Nessus Evidence maps to Evidence in Dradis projects, but what about Report Item or Report Host? We decided to get rid of the guesswork for users. Let’s jump into an early mock-up with some fat markered changes:

This design iteration would:

  • Remove those long prefixes in the plugins menu to give us some more real estate to work with 
  • Add a selector for Issue, Evidence, and Note (where applicable). This selector makes it easier for users to determine where things will end up in Dradis Projects; no more guessing! 
  • Add the validation feature to the sidebar. This is a more condensed version of what we designed initially, but all of the same info is there, just arranged in a way that would be more effective in a sidebar format.

It’s a good general direction, but dissecting this further, we didn’t like that the preview is now stacked under the editor. This is awkward and inconsistent with every other view where we show previews. This also makes for awkward placement of the save button. 

Enter the final design iteration:

We really wanted the editor to be side by side with the preview, but we needed some more space to make the editor and preview usable. Ultimately, we decided to trade the plugin menu on the left for that extra space. Removing the plugin menu enabled us to have the side-by-side layout we wanted. The keen observer may have noticed that this design moves the exporter select menu out of the validation section and into the main content area. We made this change here because users not concerned with validation would still need to select the exporter if they wanted to make edits in the editor. The validation feature is only really concerned about which report template users wish to validate against. 

After a few more minor tweaks, we implemented this design and got this final result:

Users are now able to:

  • Differentiate between Issue, Evidence, and Note templates
  • Differentiate between multiple exporters 
  • Validate that all fields are mapped accordingly

How to validate your configuration

Now that we have this awesome new feature, let’s take it for a spin. Let’s say you have a report template with some issue/evidence fields defined and your plugin of choice is Burp. 

Head over to the Plugin Manager and select Burp from the plugin menu:

Select the template you want to validate:

Then select the exporter (if there are options):

At this point, you will see the selected plugin’s template content and a preview of how it would appear based on some sample Burp output.

Now you can select a report template in the Report Template Validation panel:

A validation check will now be executed, and you will see if any fields are not mapped as expected by the report template you selected. From here, you can make edits in the editor to add those missing fields. As you type, you will see the validation panel update in real-time to show you if the configuration passes validation.

Once you see a green validation checkmark, your configuration is valid. You can start importing tool output into Dradis and exporting reports knowing that fields will appear as expected.

Pretty cool, right?

But wait, there’s more!

Earlier in this blog post, I mentioned that the Rules Engine is involved in all of this, but we haven’t touched on it yet. If you’re not familiar with the Rules Engine, it can be used to manipulate the plugin output before it imports everything into a project. For example, based on user-defined conditions, the Rules Engine can do things like:

  • Replace the description that comes from the plugin output with a custom description
  • Change the risk rating
  • Delete a finding
  • and much more.

Here is an example of a Rule being created in the Rules Engine:

We have the condition that has to be met on the left and the actions that will be executed on the right.

Up to now, when building conditions, users would have to manually enter the field that the condition would check, but this required knowledge of the plugin manager configuration. This was also prone to user errors as the field name had to exactly match a field in the plugin manager for the selected plugin. Considering that we already have these fields in Plugin Manager, there is no reason to put this burden on the user. 

With the changes to Plugin Manager, this seemed like a great time to update the Rules Engine and do something about that pesky field input. 

Another issue we tackled was the scalability of this view. With the 2-column setup (conditions on the left and the actions on the right), we found that the arrow in the center would often get misaligned. This arrow guides the user’s flow from one side to the next, but when it gets misaligned, it becomes hard to understand and sometimes, it may even add confusion. 

Keeping the above in mind, we set out to design some changes. We wanted to ensure the view could scale well, accommodating both small and large numbers of conditions and actions for each rule. After some experimenting, we decided to flip the layout into a top-down orientation to give it more of a timeline or story-like feel that paints the complete picture for users.

The view would list all conditions at the top, and as users transition their attention down the page, they would flow into the actions. We added some copy to guide the users between the conditions and actions. This layout scales well because regardless of how many conditions and actions there are, nothing gets misaligned and everything stays grouped together. Users start with their attention at the top, then transition towards the bottom with everything they need in between. We gave this design the green light, and after some further tweaks to the design, this is the implementation:

During this updated layout implementation, we also updated the condition boxes. They now have an uploader select to differentiate between the different uploaders a plugin may have (similar to the exporters in Plugin Manager). In addition, the field input has been replaced by a field selector. This Field selector lists all the possible fields based on the corresponding plugin manager configuration. Now users can simply select available fields without knowing what they are ahead of time or ensuring they don’t mistype anything. The action boxes largely remained the same with just a minor tweak to the headers where we now number the actions to convey the order of the actions executing. 

Give it a whirl

All of these changes combined make for an easier UI to follow and a less complex UX to upload scanner output, map the fields to Dradis in the Plugin Manager, process the data through the Rules Engine, and get the desired results in projects.

Give v4.4.0 a go and test out these new features yourself. Feel free to experiment with them and share your feedback with us. We’d love to know how you like this new validation feature in the Plugin Manager and the updates to the Rules Engine.

Happy Hacking ✌️
Matt