Rodauth is an authentication and account management framework for rack applications. It’s built using Roda and Sequel, but it can be used with other web frameworks, database libraries, and databases. When used with PostgreSQL, MySQL, and Microsoft SQL Server in the default configuration, it offers additional security for password hashes by protecting access via database functions.

• Security: Ship in a maximum security by default configuration

• Simplicity: Allow for easy configuration via a DSL

• Flexibility: Allow for easy overriding of any part of the framework

• Login

• Logout

• Change Password

• Change Login

• Reset Password

• Create Account

• Close Account

• Verify Account

• Confirm Password

• Remember (Autologin via token)

• Lockout (Bruteforce protection)

• OTP (2 factor authentication via TOTP)

• Recovery Codes (2 factor authentication via backup codes)

• SMS Codes (2 factor authentication via SMS)

• Verify Change Login (Reverify accounts after login changes)

• Verify Account Grace Period (Don’t require verification before login)

• Password Grace Period (Don’t require password entry if recently entered)

• Password Complexity (More sophisticated checks)

• Disallow Password Reuse

• Password Expiration

• Account Expiration

• Session Expiration

• Single Session (Only one active session per account)

• JWT (JSON API support for all other features)

• Update Password Hash (when hash cost changes)

• HTTP Basic Auth

Website

rodauth.jeremyevans.net

Demo Site

rodauth-demo.jeremyevans.net

Source

github.com/jeremyevans/rodauth

Bugs

github.com/jeremyevans/rodauth/issues

Google Group

groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/rodauth

IRC

chat.freenode.net/#rodauth

There are some dependencies that Rodauth uses by default, but are development dependencies instead of runtime dependencies in the gem as it is possible to run without them:

tilt, rack_csrf

Used by all features unless in JSON API only mode.

bcrypt

Used by default for password matching, can be skipped if password_match? is overridden for custom authentication.

mail

Used by default for mailing in the reset password, verify account, and lockout features.

rotp, rqrcode

Used by the otp feature

jwt

Used by the jwt feature

By default on PostgreSQL, MySQL, and Microsoft SQL Server, Rodauth uses database functions to access password hashes, with the user running the application unable to get direct access to password hashes. This reduces the risk of an attacker being able to access password hashes and use them to attack other sites.

The rest of this section describes this feature in more detail, but note that Rodauth does not require this feature be used and works correctly without it. There may be cases where you cannot use this feature, such as when using a different database or when you do not have full control over the database you are using.

Passwords are hashed using bcrypt, and the password hashes are kept in a separate table from the accounts table, with a foreign key referencing the accounts table. Two database functions are added, one to retrieve the salt for a password, and the other to check if a given password hash matches the password hash for the user.

Two database accounts are used. The first is the account that the application uses, which is referred to as the app account. The app account does not have access to read the password hashes. The other account handles password hashes and is referred to as the ph account. The ph account sets up the database functions that can retrieve the salt for a given account’s password, and check if a password hash matches for for a given account. The ph account sets these functions up so that the app account can execute the functions using the ph account’s permissions. This allows the app account to check passwords without having access to read password hashes.

While the app account is not be able to read password hashes, it is still be able to insert password hashes, update passwords hashes, and delete password hashes, so the additional security is not that painful.

By disallowing the app account access to the password hashes, it is much more difficult for an attacker to access the password hashes, even if they are able to exploit an SQL injection or remote code execution vulnerability in the application.

The reason for extra security in regards to password hashes stems from the fact that people tend to choose poor passwords and reuse passwords, so a compromise of one database containing password hashes can result in account access on other sites, making password hash storage of critical importance even if the other data stored is not that important.

If you are storing other sensitive information in your database, you should consider using a similar approach in other areas (or all areas) of your application.

Account verification, password resets, remember, and lockout tokens all use a similar approach. They all provide a token, in the format “account-id_long-random-string”. By including the id of the account in the token, an attacker can only attempt to bruteforce the token for a single account, instead of being able to bruteforce tokens for all accounts at once (which would be possible if the token was just a random string).

Additionally, all comparisons of tokens use a timing-safe comparison function to reduce the risk of timing attacks.

In order to get full advantages of Rodauth’s security design on PostgreSQL, multiple database accounts are involved:

1. database superuser account (usually postgres)

2. app account (same name as application)

3. ph account (application name with _password appended)

The database superuser account is used to load extensions related to the database. The application should never be run using the database superuser account.

Note that there is not a simple way to use multiple database accounts in the same PostgreSQL database on Heroku. You can still use Rodauth on Heroku, it just won’t have the same security benefits. That’s not to say it is insecure, just that it drops the security level for password hash storage to the same level as other common authentication solutions.

If you want to use the login features for Rodauth, you need to load the citext extension if you want to support case insensitive logins.

Example:

psql -U postgres -c "CREATE EXTENSION citext" ${DATABASE_NAME}

Note that on Heroku, this extension can be loaded using a standard database account. If you want logins to be case sensitive (generally considered a bad idea), you don’t need to use the PostgreSQL citext extension. Just remember to modify the migration below to use String instead of citext for the email in that case.

If you are currently running your application using the database superuser account, the first thing you need to do is to create the app database account. It’s often best to name this account the same as the database name.

You should also create the ph database account which will handle access to the password hashes.

Example for PostgreSQL:

createuser -U postgres ${DATABASE_NAME}
createuser -U postgres ${DATABASE_NAME}_password

Note that if the database superuser account owns all of the items in the database, you’ll need to change the ownership to the database account you just created. See gist.github.com/jeremyevans/8483320 for a way to do that.

MySQL does not have the concept of object owners, and MySQL’s GRANT/REVOKE support is much more limited than PostgreSQL’s. When using MySQL, it is recommended to GRANT the ph account ALL privileges on the database, including the ability to GRANT permissions to the app account:

CREATE USER '${DATABASE_NAME}'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY '${PASSWORD}';
CREATE USER '${DATABASE_NAME}_password'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY '${OTHER_PASSWORD}';
GRANT ALL ON ${DATABASE_NAME}.* TO '${DATABASE_NAME}_password'@'localhost' WITH GRANT OPTION;

You should run all migrations as the ph account, and GRANT specific access to the app account as needed.

Adding the database functions on MySQL may require setting the log_bin_trust_function_creators=1 setting in the MySQL configuration.

Microsoft SQL Server has a concept of database owners, but similar to MySQL usage it’s recommended to use the ph account as the superuser for the database, and have it GRANT permissions to the app account:

CREATE LOGIN rodauth_test WITH PASSWORD = 'rodauth_test';
CREATE LOGIN rodauth_test_password WITH PASSWORD = 'rodauth_test';
CREATE DATABASE rodauth_test;
USE rodauth_test;
CREATE USER rodauth_test FOR LOGIN rodauth_test;
GRANT CONNECT, EXECUTE TO rodauth_test;
EXECUTE sp_changedbowner 'rodauth_test_password';

You should run all migrations as the ph account, and GRANT specific access to the app account as needed.

Because two different database accounts are used, two different migrations are required, one for each database account. Here are example migrations. You can modify them to add support for additional columns, or remove tables or columns related to features that you don’t need.

First migration. On PostgreSQL, this should be run with the app account, on MySQL and Microsoft SQL Server this should be run with the ph account.

Note that these migrations require Sequel 4.35.0+. If you are using older versions of Sequel, switch the :Bignum symbols to Bignum constants.

Sequel.migration do
  up do
    extension :date_arithmetic

    # Used by the account verification and close account features
    create_table(:account_statuses) do
      Integer :id, :primary_key=>true
      String :name, :null=>false, :unique=>true
    end
    from(:account_statuses).import([:id, :name], [[1, 'Unverified'], [2, 'Verified'], [3, 'Closed']])

    db = self
    create_table(:accounts) do
      primary_key :id, :type=>:Bignum
      foreign_key :status_id, :account_statuses, :null=>false, :default=>1
      if db.database_type == :postgres
        citext :email, :null=>false
        constraint :valid_email, :email=>/^[^,;@ \r\n]+@[^,@; \r\n]+\.[^,@; \r\n]+$/
        index :email, :unique=>true, :where=>{:status_id=>[1, 2]}
      else
        String :email, :null=>false
        index :email, :unique=>true
      end
    end

    deadline_opts = proc do |days|
      if database_type == :mysql
        {:null=>false}
      else
        {:null=>false, :default=>Sequel.date_add(Sequel::CURRENT_TIMESTAMP, :days=>days)}
      end
    end

    # Used by the password reset feature
    create_table(:account_password_reset_keys) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      String :key, :null=>false
      DateTime :deadline, deadline_opts[1]
    end

    # Used by the account verification feature
    create_table(:account_verification_keys) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      String :key, :null=>false
      DateTime :requested_at, :null=>false, :default=>Sequel::CURRENT_TIMESTAMP
    end

    # Used by the remember me feature
    create_table(:account_remember_keys) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      String :key, :null=>false
      DateTime :deadline, deadline_opts[14]
    end

    # Used by the lockout feature
    create_table(:account_login_failures) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      Integer :number, :null=>false, :default=>1
    end
    create_table(:account_lockouts) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      String :key, :null=>false
      DateTime :deadline, deadline_opts[1]
    end

    # Used by the password expiration feature
    create_table(:account_password_change_times) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      DateTime :changed_at, :null=>false, :default=>Sequel::CURRENT_TIMESTAMP
    end

    # Used by the account expiration feature
    create_table(:account_activity_times) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      DateTime :last_activity_at, :null=>false
      DateTime :last_login_at, :null=>false
      DateTime :expired_at
    end

    # Used by the single session feature
    create_table(:account_session_keys) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      String :key, :null=>false
    end

    # Used by the otp feature
    create_table(:account_otp_keys) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      String :key, :null=>false
      Integer :num_failures, :null=>false, :default=>0
      Time :last_use, :null=>false, :default=>Sequel::CURRENT_TIMESTAMP
    end

    # Used by the recovery codes feature
    create_table(:account_recovery_codes) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :type=>:Bignum
      String :code
      primary_key [:id, :code]
    end

    # Used by the sms codes feature
    create_table(:account_sms_codes) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      String :phone_number, :null=>false
      Integer :num_failures
      String :code
      DateTime :code_issued_at, :null=>false, :default=>Sequel::CURRENT_TIMESTAMP
    end

    case database_type
    when :postgres
      user = get{Sequel.lit('current_user')} + '_password'
      run "GRANT REFERENCES ON accounts TO #{user}"
    when :mysql, :mssql
      user = if database_type == :mysql
        get{Sequel.lit('current_user')}.sub(/_password@/, '@')
      else
        get{DB_NAME{}}
      end
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_statuses TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON accounts TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_password_reset_keys TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_verification_keys TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_remember_keys TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_login_failures TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_lockouts TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_password_change_times TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_activity_times TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_session_keys TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_otp_keys TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_recovery_codes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT ALL ON account_sms_codes TO #{user}"
    end
  end

  down do
    drop_table(:account_sms_codes,
               :account_recovery_codes,
               :account_otp_keys,
               :account_session_keys,
               :account_activity_times,
               :account_password_change_times,
               :account_lockouts,
               :account_login_failures,
               :account_remember_keys,
               :account_verification_keys,
               :account_password_reset_keys,
               :accounts,
               :account_statuses)
  end
end

Second migration, run using the ph account:

require 'rodauth/migrations'

Sequel.migration do
  up do
    create_table(:account_password_hashes) do
      foreign_key :id, :accounts, :primary_key=>true, :type=>:Bignum
      String :password_hash, :null=>false
    end
    Rodauth.create_database_authentication_functions(self)
    case database_type
    when :postgres
      user = get{Sequel.lit('current_user')}.sub(/_password\z/, '')
      run "REVOKE ALL ON account_password_hashes FROM public"
      run "REVOKE ALL ON FUNCTION rodauth_get_salt(int8) FROM public"
      run "REVOKE ALL ON FUNCTION rodauth_valid_password_hash(int8, text) FROM public"
      run "GRANT INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE ON account_password_hashes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT SELECT(id) ON account_password_hashes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON FUNCTION rodauth_get_salt(int8) TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON FUNCTION rodauth_valid_password_hash(int8, text) TO #{user}"
    when :mysql
      user = get{Sequel.lit('current_user')}.sub(/_password@/, '@')
      db_name = get{database{}}
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON #{db_name}.* TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE ON account_password_hashes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT SELECT (id) ON account_password_hashes TO #{user}"
    when :mssql
      user = get{DB_NAME{}}
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON rodauth_get_salt TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON rodauth_valid_password_hash TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE ON account_password_hashes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT SELECT ON account_password_hashes(id) TO #{user}"
    end

    # Used by the disallow_password_reuse feature
    create_table(:account_previous_password_hashes) do
      primary_key :id, :type=>:Bignum
      foreign_key :account_id, :accounts, :type=>:Bignum
      String :password_hash, :null=>false
    end
    Rodauth.create_database_previous_password_check_functions(self)

    case database_type
    when :postgres
      user = get{Sequel.lit('current_user')}.sub(/_password\z/, '')
      run "REVOKE ALL ON account_previous_password_hashes FROM public"
      run "REVOKE ALL ON FUNCTION rodauth_get_previous_salt(int8) FROM public"
      run "REVOKE ALL ON FUNCTION rodauth_previous_password_hash_match(int8, text) FROM public"
      run "GRANT INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE ON account_previous_password_hashes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT SELECT(id, account_id) ON account_previous_password_hashes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT USAGE ON account_previous_password_hashes_id_seq TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON FUNCTION rodauth_get_previous_salt(int8) TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON FUNCTION rodauth_previous_password_hash_match(int8, text) TO #{user}"
    when :mysql
      user = get{Sequel.lit('current_user')}.sub(/_password@/, '@')
      db_name = get{database{}}
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON #{db_name}.* TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE ON account_previous_password_hashes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT SELECT (id, account_id) ON account_previous_password_hashes TO #{user}"
    when :mssql
      user = get{DB_NAME{}}
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON rodauth_get_previous_salt TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT EXECUTE ON rodauth_previous_password_hash_match TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE ON account_previous_password_hashes TO #{user}"
      run "GRANT SELECT ON account_previous_password_hashes(id, account_id) TO #{user}"
    end
  end

  down do
    Rodauth.drop_database_previous_password_check_functions(self)
    Rodauth.drop_database_authentication_functions(self)
    drop_table(:account_previous_password_hashes, :account_password_hashes)
  end
end

To support multiple separate migration users, you can run the migration for the password user using Sequel’s migration API:

Sequel.extension :migration
Sequel.postgres('DATABASE_NAME', :user=>'PASSWORD_USER_NAME') do |db|
  Sequel::Migrator.run(db, 'path/to/password_user/migrations', :table=>'schema_info_password')
end

If the database is not PostgreSQL, MySQL, or Microsoft SQL Server, or you cannot use multiple user accounts, just combine the two migrations into a single migration.

One thing to notice in the above migrations is that Rodauth uses additional tables for additional features, instead of additional columns in a single table.

Rodauth is a Roda plugin and loaded the same way other Roda plugins are loaded:

plugin :rodauth do
end

The block passed to the plugin call uses the Rodauth configuration DSL. The one configuration method that should always be used is enable, which chooses which features you would like to load:

plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout
end

Once features are loaded, you can use any of the configuration methods supported by the features. There are two types of configuration methods. The first type are called auth methods, and they take a block which overrides the default method that Rodauth uses. Inside the block, you can call super if you want to get the default behavior, though you must provide explicit arguments to super. There is no need to call super in before or after hooks, though. For example, if you want to add additional logging when a user logs in:

plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout
  after_login do
    LOGGER.info "#{account[:email]} logged in!"
  end
end

Inside the block, you are in the context of the Rodauth::Auth instance related to the request. This object has access to everything related to the request via methods:

request

RodaRequest instance

response

RodaResponse instance

scope

Roda instance

session

session hash

flash

flash message hash

account

account model instance (if set by an earlier Rodauth method)

So if you want to log the IP address for the user during login:

plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout
  after_login do
    LOGGER.info "#{account[:email]} logged in from #{request.ip}"
  end
end

The second type of configuration methods are called auth value methods. They are similar to auth methods, but instead of just accepting a block, they can optionally accept a single argument without a block, which will be treated as a block that just returns that value. For example, the accounts_table method sets the database table storing accounts, so to override it, you can call the method with a symbol for the table:

plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout
  accounts_table :users
end

Note that all auth value methods can still take a block, allowing overriding for all behavior, using any information from the request:

plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout
  accounts_table do
    request.ip.start_with?("192.168.1") ? :admins : :users
  end
end

By allowing every configuration method to take a block, Rodauth should be flexible enough to integrate into most legacy systems.

The options/methods for the supported features are listed on a separate page per feature. If these links are not active, please view the appropriate file in the doc directory.

• Base (this feature is autoloaded)

• Login Password Requirements Base (this feature is autoloaded by features that set logins/passwords)

• Email Base (this feature is autoloaded by features that send email)

• Two Factor Base (this feature is autoloaded by 2 factor authentication features)

• Login

• Logout

• Change Password

• Change Login

• Reset Password

• Create Account

• Close Account

• Verify Account

• Confirm Password

• Remember

• Lockout

• OTP

• Recovery Codes

• SMS Codes

• Verify Change Login

• Verify Account Grace Period

• Password Grace Period

• Password Complexity

• Disallow Password Reuse

• Password Expiration

• Account Expiration

• Session Expiration

• Single Session

• JWT

In general, you will usually want to call rodauth early in your route block:

route do |r|
  r.rodauth

  # ...
end

Note that will allow Rodauth to run, but it won’t force people to login or add any security to your site. If you want to force all users to login, you need to redirect to them login page if they are not already logged in:

route do |r|
  r.rodauth
  rodauth.require_authentication

  # ...
end

If only certain parts of your site require logins, then you can only redirect if they are not logged in certain branches of the routing tree:

route do |r|
  r.rodauth

  r.on "admin" do
    rodauth.require_authentication

    # ...
  end

  # ...
end

In some cases you may want to have rodauth run inside a branch of the routing tree, instead of in the root. You can do this by setting a :prefix when configuring Rodauth, and calling r.rodauth inside a matching routing tree branch:

plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout
  prefix "auth"
end

route do |r|
  r.on "auth" do
    r.rodauth
  end

  rodauth.require_authentication

  # ...
end

Most of Rodauth’s functionality is exposed via r.rodauth, which allows Rodauth to handle routes for the features you have enabled (such as /login for login). However, as you have seen above, you may want to call methods on the rodauth object, such as for checking if the current request has been authenticated.

Here are methods designed to be callable on the rodauth object outside r.rodauth:

require_login

Require the session be logged in, redirecting the request to the login page if the request has not been logged in.

require_authentication

Similar to require_login, but also requires two factor authentication if the account has setup two factor authentication. Redirects the request to the two factor authentication page if logged in but not authenticated via two factors.

logged_in?

Whether the session has been logged in.

authenticated?

Similar to logged_in?, but if the account has setup two factor authentication, whether the session has authenticated via two factors.

require_two_factor_setup

(two_factor_base feature) Require the session to have setup two factor authentication, redirecting the request to the two factor authentication setup page if not.

uses_two_factor_authentication?

(two_factor_base feature) Whether the account for the current session has setup two factor authentication.

update_last_activity

(account_expiration feature) Update the last activity time for the current account. Only makes sense to use this if you are expiring accounts based on last activity.

require_current_password

(password_expiration feature) Require a current password, redirecting the request to the change password page if the password for the account has expired.

load_memory

(remember feature) If the session has not been authenticated, look for the remember cookie. If present and valid, automatically log the session in, but mark that it was logged in via a remember key.

logged_in_via_remember_key?

(remember feature) Whether the current session has been logged in via a remember key. For security sensitive actions where you want to require the user to reenter the password, you can use the confirm_password feature.

check_session_expiration

(session_expiration feature) Check whether the current session has expired, automatically logging the session out if so.

check_single_session

(single_session expiration) Check whether the current session is still the only valid session, automatically logging the session out if not.

verified_account?

(verify_grace_period extension) Whether the account is currently verified. If false, it is because the account is allowed to login as they are in the grace period.

locked_out?

(lockout feature) Whether the account for the current session has been locked out.

Rodauth supports using multiple rodauth configurations in the same application. You just need to load the plugin a second time, providing a name for any alternate configuration:

plugin :rodauth do
end
plugin :rodauth, :name=>:secondary do
end

Then in your routing code, any time you call rodauth, you can provide the name as an argument to use that configuration:

route do |r|
  r.on 'secondary' do
    r.rodauth(:secondary)
  end

  r.rodauth
end

You can use Rodauth if you are storing password hashes in the same table as the accounts. You just need to specify which column stores the password hash:

plugin :rodauth do
  account_password_hash_column :password_hash
end

When this option is set, Rodauth will do the password hash check in ruby.

If you want to use Rodauth on PostgreSQL, MySQL, or Microsoft SQL Server without using database functions for authentication, but still storing password hashes in a separate table, you can do so:

plugin :rodauth do
  use_database_authentication_functions? false
end

Conversely, if you implement the rodauth_get_salt and rodauth_valid_password_hash functions on a database that isn’t PostgreSQL, MySQL, or Microsoft SQL Server, you can set this value to true.

You can use Rodauth with other authentication types, by overriding a single configuration setting. For example, if you have accounts stored in the database, but authentication happens via LDAP, you can use the simple_ldap_authenticator library:

require 'simple_ldap_authenticator'
plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout
  require_bcrypt? false
  password_match? do |password|
    SimpleLdapAuthenticator.valid?(account.username, password)
  end
end

If you aren’t storing accounts in the database, but want to allow any valid LDAP user to login, you can do something like this:

require 'simple_ldap_authenticator'
plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout

  # Don't require the bcrypt library, since using LDAP for auth
  require_bcrypt? false

  # Treat the login itself as the account
  account_from_login{|l| l.to_s}

  # Use the login provided as the session value
  account_session_value{account}

  # Store session value in :login key, since the :account_id
  # default wouldn't make sense
  session_key :login

  password_match? do |password|
    SimpleLdapAuthenticator.valid?(account, password)
  end
end

Note that when using custom authentication, using some of Rodauth’s features such as change login and change password either would not make sense or would require some additional custom configuration. The login and logout features should work correctly with the examples above, though.

You can use Rodauth even if your application does not use the Roda web framework. This is possible by adding a Roda middleware that uses Rodauth:

require 'roda'

class RodauthApp < Roda
  plugin :middleware
  plugin :rodauth do
    enable :login
  end

  route do |r|
    r.rodauth
    rodauth.require_authentication
    env['rodauth'] = rodauth
  end
end

use RodauthApp

Note that Rodauth expects the Roda app it is used in to provide a layout. So if you are using Rodauth as middleware for another app, if you don’t have a views/layout.erb file that Rodauth can use, you should probably also add load Roda’s render plugin with the appropriate settings that allow Rodauth to use the same layout as the application.

By setting env['rodauth'] = rodauth in the route block inside the middleware, you can easily provide a way for your application to call Rodauth methods.

Here are some examples of integrating Rodauth into applications that doesn’t use Roda:

• Ginatra, a Sinatra-based git repository viewer

• Rodauth’s demo site as a Rails application ( This uses the roda-rails gem so that Rodauth uses Rails’ CSRF and flash support)

• Grape application

• Hanami application

Rodauth ships with 2 factor authentication support via TOTP (Time-Based One-Time Passwords, RFC 6238). There are a wide variety of ways in which to integrate 2 factor authentication into your site with Rodauth, based on the needs of the application.

The 2 factor authentication support is part of the OTP feature, which needs to be enabled in addition to the login feature. In addition, when implementing 2 factor authentication, you should generally provide a backup 2nd factor if the primary second factor is not available. Rodauth supports SMS codes and recovery codes as other 2nd factors.

If you want to support but not require 2 factor authentication:

plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login, :logout, :otp, :recovery_codes, :sms_codes
end
route do |r|
  r.rodauth
  rodauth.require_authentication

  # ...
end

If you want to force all users to use OTP authentication, requiring users that don’t currently have an account to set one up:

route do |r|
  r.rodauth
  rodauth.require_authentication
  rodauth.require_two_factor_authentication_setup

  # ...
end

Similarly to requiring authentication in general, it’s possible to require login authentication for most of the site, but require 2 factor authentication only for particular branches:

route do |r|
  r.rodauth
  rodauth.require_login

  r.on "admin" do
    rodauth.require_two_factor_authenticated
  end

  # ...
end

To add support for handling JSON responses, you can pass the :json option to the plugin, and enable the JWT feature in addition to other features you plan to use:

plugin :rodauth, :json=>true do
  enable :login, :logout, :jwt
end

If you do not want to load the HTML plugins that Rodauth usually loads (render, csrf, flash, h), because you are building a JSON-only API, pass :json => :only

plugin :rodauth, :json=>:only do
  enable :login, :logout, :jwt
end

Note that by default, the features that send email depend on the render plugin, so if using the :json=>:only option, you either need to load the render plugin manually or you need to use the necessary *_email_body configuration options to specify the body of the emails.

The JWT feature enables JSON API support for all of the other features that Rodauth ships with.

Inside the configuration block, you can use auth_class_eval to add custom methods that will be callable on the rodauth object.

plugin :rodauth do
  enable :login

  auth_class_eval do
    def require_admin
      request.redirect("/") unless account[:admin]
    end
  end
end

route do |r|
  r.rodauth

  r.on "admin" do
    rodauth.require_admin
  end
end

The enable configuration method is able to load features external to Rodauth. You need to place the external feature file where it can be required via rodauth/features/feature_name. That file should use the following basic structure

module Rodauth
  # :feature_name will be the argument given to enable to
  # load the feature
  FeatureName = Feature.define(:feature_name) do
    # Shortcut for defining auth value methods with static values
    auth_value_method :method_name, 1 # method_value

    auth_value_methods # one argument per auth value method

    auth_methods # one argument per auth method

    route do |r|
      # This block is taken for requests to the feature's route.
      # This block is evaluated in the scope of the Rodauth::Auth instance.
      # r is the Roda::RodaRequest instance for the request

      r.get do
      end

      r.post do
      end
    end

    configuration_eval do
      # define additional configuration specific methods here, if any
    end

    # define the default behavior for the auth_methods
    # and auth_value_methods
    # ...
  end
end

See the source code for the features that ship with Rodauth for an example of how to construct features.

All of Rodauth’s configuration methods change the behavior of the Rodauth::Auth instance. However, in some cases you may want to overriding handling at the routing layer. You can do this easily by adding an appropriate route before calling r.rodauth:

route do |r|
  r.post 'login' do
    # Custom POST /login handling here
  end

  r.rodauth
end

To upgrade from 0.9.x to the current version, if you were using the account_valid_password database function, you need to drop it and add the two database functions listed in the migration section above. You can add the following code to a migration to accomplish that:

require 'rodauth/migrations'
run "DROP FUNCTION account_valid_password(int8, text);"
Rodauth.create_database_authentication_functions(self)
run "REVOKE ALL ON FUNCTION rodauth_get_salt(int8) FROM public"
run "REVOKE ALL ON FUNCTION rodauth_valid_password_hash(int8, text) FROM public"
run "GRANT EXECUTE ON FUNCTION rodauth_get_salt(int8) TO ${DATABASE_NAME}"
run "GRANT EXECUTE ON FUNCTION rodauth_valid_password_hash(int8, text) TO ${DATABASE_NAME}"

All of these are Rails-specific:

• Devise

• Authlogic

• Sorcery

Jeremy Evans <[email protected]>