Ruby on Rails
HowToQuicklyDoAuthenticationWithLoginGenerator (Version #79)

This no longer works for rails version 2.0.2. An update for this generator is necessary

Install the LoginGenerator gem:
```
gem install login_generator
```
Generate a login system, we’ll call it “Account¹”
```
ruby script/generate login Account
```

Make a table to store users; choose the flavor that suits your needs:

mysql syntax:
  CREATE TABLE users (
    id int(11) NOT NULL auto_increment,
    login varchar(80) default NULL,
    password varchar(40) default NULL,
    PRIMARY KEY  (id)
  );


postgres :

  CREATE TABLE “users” (

     “id” SERIAL NOT NULL UNIQUE,

     “login” TEXT,

     “password” TEXT,

     PRIMARY KEY

  ) WITH OIDS;

sqlite: CREATE TABLE ‘users’ ( ‘id’ INTEGER PRIMARY KEY NOT NULL, ‘login’ VARCHAR DEFAULT NULL, ‘password’ VARCHAR DEFAULT NULL );

or using rake migrate


class CreateUsers < ActiveRecord::Migration
  def self.up
  create_table :users do |t|
  t.column :login, :string, :default => nil
  t.column :password, :string, :default => nil
  end
  end


def self.down
drop_table :users
end

end

If you want to add a default user make sure to set passwordconfirmation in the migration_ (add this line in self.up)


User.create(:login => 'admin',
  :password => 'password',
  :password_confirmation => 'password')

Edit app/controllers/application.rb, and make it look something like this:
```
require 'login_system'
```

class ApplicationController < ActionController::Base include LoginSystem model :user end

Edit app/controllers/account_controller.rb to set who if anyone can delete users. Until they have admin roles, most people can set it so only account holders can delete their account:
```
def delete
  if params['id'] && @session['user'] && @session['user'].id == params['id']
```

Edit your own controllers now, and add the line

before_filter :login_required

to the inside of the class so that it ends up looking something like this:

class AllMySecretsController < ApplicationController
   before_filter :login_required
   
   def show_one_secret
      ...
   end
end

Of course, I sometimes don’t want every method hidden behind the iron curtain, so I can exclude some of them (such as show_one_secret above) from being protected like so:
```
class AllMySecretsController < ApplicationController
   before_filter :login_required, :except => [ :show_one_secret ]
   
   def show_one_secret
      ...
   end
end
```
Now, we’re all eager to actually add users too, so let’s go ahead and do that. Point your browser to:
http://myrails.foobar.com/account/signup

and voila! you can start adding users.

Much info taken from Login Generator’s README_LOGIN
——

¹ You can call the login controller whatever you want (Account is just an example). However to change the login system to use a model other than “User” (for instance "MyModel") you will need to modify the following:

lib/login_system.rb (“user” to "my_model")
app/controllers/your_controller.rb (“user” to “my_model” and “User” to "MyModel")
app/controllers/application.rb (change the model from “user” to "my_model")
app/models/user.rb(rename from “user.rb” to “my_model.rb” and change “User” to “MyModel” and “user” to "my_model")
app/views/login.rhtml (“user_” to "my_model_")
app/views/signup.rhtml (“user_” to "my_model_")

category: Howto