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"Restful Authentication Generator":http://github.com/technoweenie/restful-authentication

This widely-used plugin provides a foundation for securely managing user authentication:

  • Login / logout
  • Secure password handling
  • Account activation by validating email
  • Account approval / disabling by admin
  • Rudimentary hooks for authorization and access control.

Several features were updated in May, 2008.

IMPORTANT: if you upgrade your site, existing user account passwords will stop working unless you use --old-passwords

Issue Tracker

Please submit any bugs or annoyances on the lighthouse tracker at

For anything simple enough, please github message both maintainers: Rick Olson ("technoweenie":http://github.com/technoweenie) and Flip Kromer ("mrflip":http://github.com/mrflip).

Documentation

This page has notes on

  • "Installation":#INSTALL
  • "New Features":#AWESOME
  • "After installing":#POST-INSTALL

See the "wiki":http://github.com/technoweenie/restful-authentication/wikis/home (or the notes/ directory) if you want to learn more about:

  • "Extensions, Addons and Alternatives":addons such as HAML templates
  • "Security Design Patterns":security-patterns with "snazzy diagram":http://github.com/technoweenie/restful-authentication/tree/master/notes/SecurityFramework.png
  • Authentication -- Lets a visitor identify herself (and lay claim to her corresponding Roles and measure of Trust)
  • "Trust Metrics":Trustification -- Confidence we can rely on the outcomes of this visitor's actions.
  • Authorization and Policy -- Based on trust and identity, what actions may this visitor perform?
  • Access Control -- How the Authorization policy is actually enforced in your code (A: hopefully without turning it into a spaghetti of if thens)
  • Rails Plugins for Authentication, Trust, Authorization and Access Control
  • Tradeoffs -- for the paranoid or the curious, a rundown of tradeoffs made in the code
  • CHANGELOG -- Summary of changes to internals
  • TODO -- Ideas for how you can help

These best version of the release notes are in the notes/ directory in the "source code":http://github.com/technoweenie/restful-authentication/tree/master -- look there for the latest version. The wiki versions are taken (manually) from there.

Exciting new features

Stories

There are now "Cucumber":http://wiki.github.com/aslakhellesoy/cucumber/home features that allow expressive, enjoyable tests for the authentication code. The flexible code for resource testing in stories was extended from "Ben Mabey's.":http://www.benmabey.com/2008/02/04/rspec-plain-text-stories-webrat-chunky-bacon/

Modularize to match security design patterns:

  • Authentication (currently: password, browser cookie token, HTTP basic)
  • Trust metric (email validation)
  • Authorization (stateful roles)
  • Leave a flexible framework that will play nicely with other access control / policy definition / trust metric plugins

Other

  • Added a few helper methods for linking to user pages
  • Uniform handling of logout, remember_token
  • Stricter email, login field validation
  • Minor security fixes -- see CHANGELOG

Non-backwards compatible Changes

Here are a few changes in the May 2008 release that increase "Defense in Depth" but may require changes to existing accounts

  • If you have an existing site, none of these changes are compelling enough to warrant migrating your userbase.
  • If you are generating for a new site, all of these changes are low-impact. You should apply them.

Passwords

The new password encryption (using a site key salt and stretching) will break existing user accounts' passwords. We recommend you use the --old-passwords option or write a migration tool and submit it as a patch. See the [[Tradeoffs]] note for more information.

Validations

By default, email and usernames are validated against a somewhat strict pattern; your users' values may be now illegal. Adjust to suit.

Installation

This is a basic restful authentication generator for rails, taken from acts as authenticated. Currently it requires Rails 1.2.6 or above.

IMPORTANT FOR RAILS > 2.1 USERS To avoid a @NameError@ exception ("lighthouse tracker ticket":http://rails_security.lighthouseapp.com/projects/15332-restful_authentication/tickets/2-not-a-valid-constant-name-errors#ticket-2-2), check out the code to have an underscore and not dash in its name:

  • either use git clone git://github.com/technoweenie/restful-authentication.git restful_authentication
  • or rename the plugin's directory to be restful_authentication after fetching it.

To use the generator:

./script/generate authenticated user sessions
--include-activation
--stateful
--rspec
--skip-migration
--skip-routes
--old-passwords

  • The first parameter specifies the model that gets created in signup (typically a user or account model). A model with migration is created, as well as a basic controller with the create method. You probably want to say "User" here.

  • The second parameter specifies the session controller name. This is the controller that handles the actual login/logout function on the site. (probably: "Session").

  • --include-activation: Generates the code for a ActionMailer and its respective Activation Code through email.

  • --stateful: Builds in support for acts_as_state_machine and generates activation code. (@--stateful@ implies @--include-activation@). Based on the idea at [[http://www.vaporbase.com/postings/stateful_authentication]]. Passing @--skip-migration@ will skip the user migration, and @--skip-routes@ will skip resource generation -- both useful if you've already run this generator. (Needs the "acts_as_state_machine plugin":http://elitists.textdriven.com/svn/plugins/acts_as_state_machine/, but new installs should probably run with @--aasm@ instead.)

  • --aasm: Works the same as stateful but uses the "updated aasm gem":http://github.com/rubyist/aasm/tree/master

  • --rspec: Generate RSpec tests and Stories in place of standard rails tests. This requires the "RSpec and Rspec-on-rails plugins":http://rspec.info/ (make sure you "./script/generate rspec" after installing RSpec.) The rspec and story suite are much more thorough than the rails tests, and changes are unlikely to be backported.

  • --old-passwords: Use the older password scheme (see [[#COMPATIBILITY]], above)

  • --skip-migration: Don't generate a migration file for this model

  • --skip-routes: Don't generate a resource line in @config/routes.rb@

After installing

The below assumes a Model named 'User' and a Controller named 'Session'; please alter to suit. There are additional security minutae in @notes/README-Tradeoffs@ -- only the paranoid or the curious need bother, though.

  • Add these familiar login URLs to your @config/routes.rb@ if you like:

    
  map.signup  '/signup', :controller => 'users',   :action => 'new'
  map.login  '/login',  :controller => 'session', :action => 'new'
  map.logout '/logout', :controller => 'session', :action => 'destroy'

  • With @--include-activation@, also add to your @config/routes.rb@:

    
  map.activate '/activate/:activation_code', :controller => 'users', :action => 'activate', :activation_code => nil

    and add an observer to @config/environment.rb@:

    
  config.active_record.observers = :user_observer

    Pay attention, may be this is not an issue for everybody, but if you should have problems, that the sent activation_code does match with that in the database stored, reload your user object before sending its data through email something like:

    
  class UserObserver < ActiveRecord::Observer
    def after_create(user)
      user.reload
      UserMailer.deliver_signup_notification(user)
    end
    def after_save(user)
      user.reload
      UserMailer.deliver_activation(user) if user.recently_activated?
    end
  end

  • With @--stateful@, add an observer to config/environment.rb:

    
  config.active_record.observers = :user_observer

    and modify the users resource line to read

    map.resources :users, :member => { :suspend => :put, :unsuspend => :put, :purge => :delete }

  • If you use a public repository for your code (such as github, rubyforge, gitorious, etc.) make sure to NOT post your site_keys.rb (add a line like '/config/initializers/site_keys.rb' to your .gitignore or do the svn ignore dance), but make sure you DO keep it backed up somewhere safe.