Module: ActionController::HttpAuthentication::Basic

Extended by:
Basic
Included in:
Basic
Defined in:
lib/action_controller/metal/http_authentication.rb

Overview

Makes it dead easy to do HTTP Basic and Digest authentication.

Simple Basic example

class PostsController < ApplicationController
http_basic_authenticate_with :name => "dhh", :password => "secret", :except => :index

def index
  render :text => "Everyone can see me!"
end

def edit
  render :text => "I'm only accessible if you know the password"
end

end

Advanced Basic example

Here is a more advanced Basic example where only Atom feeds and the XML API is protected by HTTP authentication, the regular HTML interface is protected by a session approach:

class ApplicationController < ActionController::Base
before_filter :set_account, :authenticate

protected
  def 
    @account = Account.find_by_url_name(request.subdomains.first)
  end

  def authenticate
    case request.format
    when Mime::XML, Mime::ATOM
      if user = authenticate_with_http_basic { |u, p| @account.users.authenticate(u, p) }
        @current_user = user
      else
        request_http_basic_authentication
      end
    else
      if session_authenticated?
        @current_user = @account.users.find(session[:authenticated][:user_id])
      else
        redirect_to() and return false
      end
    end
  end
end

In your integration tests, you can do something like this:

def test_access_granted_from_xml
get(
  "/notes/1.xml", nil,
  'HTTP_AUTHORIZATION' => ActionController::HttpAuthentication::Basic.encode_credentials(users(:dhh).name, users(:dhh).password)
)

assert_equal 200, status
end

Simple Digest example

require 'digest/md5'
class PostsController < ApplicationController
REALM = "SuperSecret"
USERS = {"dhh" => "secret", #plain text password
         "dap" => Digest::MD5.hexdigest(["dap",REALM,"secret"].join(":"))}  #ha1 digest password

before_filter :authenticate, :except => [:index]

def index
  render :text => "Everyone can see me!"
end

def edit
  render :text => "I'm only accessible if you know the password"
end

private
  def authenticate
    authenticate_or_request_with_http_digest(REALM) do |username|
      USERS[username]
    end
  end
end

Notes

The authenticate_or_request_with_http_digest block must return the user's password or the ha1 digest hash so the framework can appropriately hash to check the user's credentials. Returning nil will cause authentication to fail.

Storing the ha1 hash: MD5(username:realm:password), is better than storing a plain password. If the password file or database is compromised, the attacker would be able to use the ha1 hash to authenticate as the user at this realm, but would not have the user's password to try using at other sites.

In rare instances, web servers or front proxies strip authorization headers before they reach your application. You can debug this situation by logging all environment variables, and check for HTTP_AUTHORIZATION, amongst others.

Defined Under Namespace

Modules: ControllerMethods

Instance Method Summary collapse

Instance Method Details

#authenticate(request, &login_procedure) ⇒ Object 



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# File 'lib/action_controller/metal/http_authentication.rb', line 133

def authenticate(request, &)
  unless request.authorization.blank?
    .call(*user_name_and_password(request))
  end
end

#authentication_request(controller, realm) ⇒ Object 



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# File 'lib/action_controller/metal/http_authentication.rb', line 151

def authentication_request(controller, realm)
  controller.headers["WWW-Authenticate"] = %(Basic realm="#{realm.gsub(/"/, "")}")
  controller.response_body = "HTTP Basic: Access denied.\n"
  controller.status = 401
end

#decode_credentials(request) ⇒ Object 



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# File 'lib/action_controller/metal/http_authentication.rb', line 143

def decode_credentials(request)
  ::Base64.decode64(request.authorization.split(' ', 2).last || '')
end

#encode_credentials(user_name, password) ⇒ Object 



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# File 'lib/action_controller/metal/http_authentication.rb', line 147

def encode_credentials(user_name, password)
  "Basic #{::Base64.strict_encode64("#{user_name}:#{password}")}"
end

#user_name_and_password(request) ⇒ Object 



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# File 'lib/action_controller/metal/http_authentication.rb', line 139

def user_name_and_password(request)
  decode_credentials(request).split(/:/, 2)
end