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=============================
User authentication in Django
=============================
Django comes with a user authentication system. It handles user accounts,
groups, permissions and cookie-based user sessions. This document explains how
things work.
Overview
========
The auth system consists of:
* Users
* Permissions: Binary (yes/no) flags designating whether a user may perform
a certain task.
* Groups: A generic way of applying labels and permissions to more than one
user.
* Messages: A simple way to queue messages for given users.
Installation
============
Authentication support is bundled as a Django application in
``django.contrib.auth``. To install it, do the following:
1. Put ``'django.contrib.auth'`` in your ``INSTALLED_APPS`` setting.
2. Run the command ``manage.py syncdb``.
Note that the default ``settings.py`` file created by
``django-admin.py startproject`` includes ``'django.contrib.auth'`` in
``INSTALLED_APPS`` for convenience. If your ``INSTALLED_APPS`` already contains
``'django.contrib.auth'``, feel free to run ``manage.py syncdb`` again; you
can run that command as many times as you'd like, and each time it'll only
install what's needed.
The ``syncdb`` command creates the necessary database tables, creates
permission objects for all installed apps that need 'em, and prompts you to
create a superuser account the first time you run it.
Once you've taken those steps, that's it.
Users
=====
Users are represented by a standard Django model, which lives in
`django/contrib/auth/models.py`_.
.. _django/contrib/auth/models.py: http://code.djangoproject.com/browser/django/trunk/django/contrib/auth/models.py
API reference
-------------
Fields
~~~~~~
``User`` objects have the following fields:
* ``username`` -- Required. 30 characters or fewer. Alphanumeric characters
only (letters, digits and underscores).
* ``first_name`` -- Optional. 30 characters or fewer.
* ``last_name`` -- Optional. 30 characters or fewer.
* ``email`` -- Optional. E-mail address.
* ``password`` -- Required. A hash of, and metadata about, the password.
(Django doesn't store the raw password.) Raw passwords can be arbitrarily
long and can contain any character. See the "Passwords" section below.
* ``is_staff`` -- Boolean. Designates whether this user can access the
admin site.
* ``is_active`` -- Boolean. Designates whether this account can be used
to log in. Set this flag to ``False`` instead of deleting accounts.
* ``is_superuser`` -- Boolean. Designates that this user has all permissions
without explicitly assigning them.
* ``last_login`` -- A datetime of the user's last login. Is set to the
current date/time by default.
* ``date_joined`` -- A datetime designating when the account was created.
Is set to the current date/time by default when the account is created.
Methods
~~~~~~~
``User`` objects have two many-to-many fields: ``groups`` and
``user_permissions``. ``User`` objects can access their related
objects in the same way as any other `Django model`_::
myuser.groups = [group_list]
myuser.groups.add(group, group, ...)
myuser.groups.remove(group, group, ...)
myuser.groups.clear()
myuser.user_permissions = [permission_list]
myuser.user_permissions.add(permission, permission, ...)
myuser.user_permissions.remove(permission, permission, ...)
myuser.user_permissions.clear()
In addition to those automatic API methods, ``User`` objects have the following
custom methods:
* ``is_anonymous()`` -- Always returns ``False``. This is a way of
differentiating ``User`` and ``AnonymousUser`` objects. Generally, you
should prefer using ``is_authenticated()`` to this method.
* ``is_authenticated()`` -- Always returns ``True``. This is a way to
tell if the user has been authenticated. This does not imply any
permissions, and doesn't check if the user is active - it only indicates
that the user has provided a valid username and password.
* ``get_full_name()`` -- Returns the ``first_name`` plus the ``last_name``,
with a space in between.
* ``set_password(raw_password)`` -- Sets the user's password to the given
raw string, taking care of the password hashing. Doesn't save the
``User`` object.
* ``check_password(raw_password)`` -- Returns ``True`` if the given raw
string is the correct password for the user. (This takes care of the
password hashing in making the comparison.)
* ``set_unusable_password()`` -- **New in Django development version.**
Marks the user as having no password set. This isn't the same as having
a blank string for a password. ``check_password()`` for this user will
never return ``True``. Doesn't save the ``User`` object.
You may need this if authentication for your application takes place
against an existing external source such as an LDAP directory.
* ``has_usable_password()`` -- **New in Django development version.**
Returns ``False`` if ``set_unusable_password()`` has been called for this
user.
* ``get_group_permissions()`` -- Returns a list of permission strings that
the user has, through his/her groups.
* ``get_all_permissions()`` -- Returns a list of permission strings that
the user has, both through group and user permissions.
* ``has_perm(perm)`` -- Returns ``True`` if the user has the specified
permission, where perm is in the format ``"package.codename"``.
If the user is inactive, this method will always return ``False``.
* ``has_perms(perm_list)`` -- Returns ``True`` if the user has each of the
specified permissions, where each perm is in the format
``"package.codename"``. If the user is inactive, this method will
always return ``False``.
* ``has_module_perms(package_name)`` -- Returns ``True`` if the user has
any permissions in the given package (the Django app label).
If the user is inactive, this method will always return ``False``.
* ``get_and_delete_messages()`` -- Returns a list of ``Message`` objects in
the user's queue and deletes the messages from the queue.
* ``email_user(subject, message, from_email=None)`` -- Sends an e-mail to
the user. If ``from_email`` is ``None``, Django uses the
`DEFAULT_FROM_EMAIL`_ setting.
* ``get_profile()`` -- Returns a site-specific profile for this user.
Raises ``django.contrib.auth.models.SiteProfileNotAvailable`` if the current site
doesn't allow profiles. For information on how to define a
site-specific user profile, see the section on `storing additional
user information`_ below.
.. _Django model: ../model-api/
.. _DEFAULT_FROM_EMAIL: ../settings/#default-from-email
.. _storing additional user information: #storing-additional-information-about-users
Manager functions
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The ``User`` model has a custom manager that has the following helper functions:
* ``create_user(username, email, password=None)`` -- Creates, saves and
returns a ``User``. The ``username``, ``email`` and ``password`` are set
as given, and the ``User`` gets ``is_active=True``.
If no password is provided, ``set_unusable_password()`` will be called.
See `Creating users`_ for example usage.
* ``make_random_password(length=10, allowed_chars='abcdefghjkmnpqrstuvwxyzABCDEFGHJKLMNPQRSTUVWXYZ23456789')``
Returns a random password with the given length and given string of
allowed characters. (Note that the default value of ``allowed_chars``
doesn't contain letters that can cause user confusion, including
``1``, ``I`` and ``0``).
Basic usage
-----------
Creating users
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The most basic way to create users is to use the ``create_user`` helper
function that comes with Django::
>>> from django.contrib.auth.models import User
>>> user = User.objects.create_user('john', 'lennon@thebeatles.com', 'johnpassword')
# At this point, user is a User object that has already been saved
# to the database. You can continue to change its attributes
# if you want to change other fields.
>>> user.is_staff = True
>>> user.save()
Changing passwords
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Change a password with ``set_password()``::
>>> from django.contrib.auth.models import User
>>> u = User.objects.get(username__exact='john')
>>> u.set_password('new password')
>>> u.save()
Don't set the ``password`` attribute directly unless you know what you're
doing. This is explained in the next section.
Passwords
---------
The ``password`` attribute of a ``User`` object is a string in this format::
hashtype$salt$hash
That's hashtype, salt and hash, separated by the dollar-sign character.
Hashtype is either ``sha1`` (default), ``md5`` or ``crypt`` -- the algorithm
used to perform a one-way hash of the password. Salt is a random string used
to salt the raw password to create the hash. Note that the ``crypt`` method is
only supported on platforms that have the standard Python ``crypt`` module
available, and ``crypt`` support is only available in the Django development
version.
For example::
sha1$a1976$a36cc8cbf81742a8fb52e221aaeab48ed7f58ab4
The ``User.set_password()`` and ``User.check_password()`` functions handle
the setting and checking of these values behind the scenes.
Previous Django versions, such as 0.90, used simple MD5 hashes without password
salts. For backwards compatibility, those are still supported; they'll be
converted automatically to the new style the first time ``User.check_password()``
works correctly for a given user.
Anonymous users
---------------
``django.contrib.auth.models.AnonymousUser`` is a class that implements
the ``django.contrib.auth.models.User`` interface, with these differences:
* ``id`` is always ``None``.
* ``is_staff`` and ``is_superuser`` are always ``False``.
* ``is_active`` is always ``False``.
* ``groups`` and ``user_permissions`` are always empty.
* ``is_anonymous()`` returns ``True`` instead of ``False``.
* ``is_authenticated()`` returns ``False`` instead of ``True``.
* ``has_perm()`` always returns ``False``.
* ``set_password()``, ``check_password()``, ``save()``, ``delete()``,
``set_groups()`` and ``set_permissions()`` raise ``NotImplementedError``.
In practice, you probably won't need to use ``AnonymousUser`` objects on your
own, but they're used by Web requests, as explained in the next section.
Creating superusers
-------------------
``manage.py syncdb`` prompts you to create a superuser the first time you run
it after adding ``'django.contrib.auth'`` to your ``INSTALLED_APPS``. But if
you need to create a superuser after that via the command line, you can use the
``create_superuser.py`` utility. Just run this command::
python /path/to/django/contrib/auth/create_superuser.py
Make sure to substitute ``/path/to/`` with the path to the Django codebase on
your filesystem.
Storing additional information about users
------------------------------------------
If you'd like to store additional information related to your users,
Django provides a method to specify a site-specific related model --
termed a "user profile" -- for this purpose.
To make use of this feature, define a model with fields for the
additional information you'd like to store, or additional methods
you'd like to have available, and also add a ``ForeignKey`` from your
model to the ``User`` model, specified with ``unique=True`` to ensure
only one instance of your model can be created for each ``User``.
To indicate that this model is the user profile model for a given
site, fill in the setting ``AUTH_PROFILE_MODULE`` with a string
consisting of the following items, separated by a dot:
1. The (normalized to lower-case) name of the application in which the
user profile model is defined (in other words, an all-lowercase
version of the name which was passed to ``manage.py startapp`` to
create the application).
2. The (normalized to lower-case) name of the model class.
For example, if the profile model was a class named ``UserProfile``
and was defined inside an application named ``accounts``, the
appropriate setting would be::
AUTH_PROFILE_MODULE = 'accounts.userprofile'
When a user profile model has been defined and specified in this
manner, each ``User`` object will have a method -- ``get_profile()``
-- which returns the instance of the user profile model associated
with that ``User``.
For more information, see `Chapter 12 of the Django book`_.
.. _Chapter 12 of the Django book: http://www.djangobook.com/en/1.0/chapter12/#cn222
Authentication in Web requests
==============================
Until now, this document has dealt with the low-level APIs for manipulating
authentication-related objects. On a higher level, Django can hook this
authentication framework into its system of `request objects`_.
First, install the ``SessionMiddleware`` and ``AuthenticationMiddleware``
middlewares by adding them to your ``MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES`` setting. See the
`session documentation`_ for more information.
Once you have those middlewares installed, you'll be able to access
``request.user`` in views. ``request.user`` will give you a ``User`` object
representing the currently logged-in user. If a user isn't currently logged in,
``request.user`` will be set to an instance of ``AnonymousUser`` (see the
previous section). You can tell them apart with ``is_authenticated()``, like so::
if request.user.is_authenticated():
# Do something for authenticated users.
else:
# Do something for anonymous users.
.. _request objects: ../request_response/#httprequest-objects
.. _session documentation: ../sessions/
How to log a user in
--------------------
Django provides two functions in ``django.contrib.auth``: ``authenticate()``
and ``login()``.
To authenticate a given username and password, use ``authenticate()``. It
takes two keyword arguments, ``username`` and ``password``, and it returns
a ``User`` object if the password is valid for the given username. If the
password is invalid, ``authenticate()`` returns ``None``. Example::
from django.contrib.auth import authenticate
user = authenticate(username='john', password='secret')
if user is not None:
if user.is_active:
print "You provided a correct username and password!"
else:
print "Your account has been disabled!"
else:
print "Your username and password were incorrect."
To log a user in, in a view, use ``login()``. It takes an ``HttpRequest``
object and a ``User`` object. ``login()`` saves the user's ID in the session,
using Django's session framework, so, as mentioned above, you'll need to make
sure to have the session middleware installed.
This example shows how you might use both ``authenticate()`` and ``login()``::
from django.contrib.auth import authenticate, login
def my_view(request):
username = request.POST['username']
password = request.POST['password']
user = authenticate(username=username, password=password)
if user is not None:
if user.is_active:
login(request, user)
# Redirect to a success page.
else:
# Return a 'disabled account' error message
else:
# Return an 'invalid login' error message.
.. admonition:: Calling ``authenticate()`` first
When you're manually logging a user in, you *must* call
``authenticate()`` before you call ``login()``. ``authenticate()``
sets an attribute on the ``User`` noting which authentication
backend successfully authenticated that user (see the `backends
documentation`_ for details), and this information is needed later
during the login process.
.. _backends documentation: #other-authentication-sources
Manually checking a user's password
-----------------------------------
If you'd like to manually authenticate a user by comparing a
plain-text password to the hashed password in the database, use the
convenience function ``django.contrib.auth.models.check_password``. It
takes two arguments: the plain-text password to check, and the full
value of a user's ``password`` field in the database to check against,
and returns ``True`` if they match, ``False`` otherwise.
How to log a user out
---------------------
To log out a user who has been logged in via ``django.contrib.auth.login()``,
use ``django.contrib.auth.logout()`` within your view. It takes an
``HttpRequest`` object and has no return value. Example::
from django.contrib.auth import logout
def logout_view(request):
logout(request)
# Redirect to a success page.
Note that ``logout()`` doesn't throw any errors if the user wasn't logged in.
Limiting access to logged-in users
----------------------------------
The raw way
~~~~~~~~~~~
The simple, raw way to limit access to pages is to check
``request.user.is_authenticated()`` and either redirect to a login page::
from django.http import HttpResponseRedirect
def my_view(request):
if not request.user.is_authenticated():
return HttpResponseRedirect('/login/?next=%s' % request.path)
# ...
...or display an error message::
def my_view(request):
if not request.user.is_authenticated():
return render_to_response('myapp/login_error.html')
# ...
The login_required decorator
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As a shortcut, you can use the convenient ``login_required`` decorator::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import login_required
def my_view(request):
# ...
my_view = login_required(my_view)
Here's an equivalent example, using the more compact decorator syntax
introduced in Python 2.4::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import login_required
@login_required
def my_view(request):
# ...
In the Django development version, ``login_required`` also takes an optional
``redirect_field_name`` parameter. Example::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import login_required
def my_view(request):
# ...
my_view = login_required(redirect_field_name='redirect_to')(my_view)
Again, an equivalent example of the more compact decorator syntax introduced in Python 2.4::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import login_required
@login_required(redirect_field_name='redirect_to')
def my_view(request):
# ...
``login_required`` does the following:
* If the user isn't logged in, redirect to ``settings.LOGIN_URL``
(``/accounts/login/`` by default), passing the current absolute URL
in the query string as ``next`` or the value of ``redirect_field_name``.
For example:
``/accounts/login/?next=/polls/3/``.
* If the user is logged in, execute the view normally. The view code is
free to assume the user is logged in.
Note that you'll need to map the appropriate Django view to ``settings.LOGIN_URL``.
For example, using the defaults, add the following line to your URLconf::
(r'^accounts/login/$', 'django.contrib.auth.views.login'),
Here's what ``django.contrib.auth.views.login`` does:
* If called via ``GET``, it displays a login form that POSTs to the same
URL. More on this in a bit.
* If called via ``POST``, it tries to log the user in. If login is
successful, the view redirects to the URL specified in ``next``. If
``next`` isn't provided, it redirects to ``settings.LOGIN_REDIRECT_URL``
(which defaults to ``/accounts/profile/``). If login isn't successful,
it redisplays the login form.
It's your responsibility to provide the login form in a template called
``registration/login.html`` by default. This template gets passed three
template context variables:
* ``form``: A ``FormWrapper`` object representing the login form. See the
`forms documentation`_ for more on ``FormWrapper`` objects.
* ``next``: The URL to redirect to after successful login. This may contain
a query string, too.
* ``site_name``: The name of the current ``Site``, according to the
``SITE_ID`` setting. If you're using the Django development version and
you don't have the site framework installed, this will be set to the
value of ``request.META['SERVER_NAME']``. For more on sites, see the
`site framework docs`_.
If you'd prefer not to call the template ``registration/login.html``, you can
pass the ``template_name`` parameter via the extra arguments to the view in
your URLconf. For example, this URLconf line would use ``myapp/login.html``
instead::
(r'^accounts/login/$', 'django.contrib.auth.views.login', {'template_name': 'myapp/login.html'}),
Here's a sample ``registration/login.html`` template you can use as a starting
point. It assumes you have a ``base.html`` template that defines a ``content``
block::
{% extends "base.html" %}
{% block content %}
{% if form.has_errors %}
<p>Your username and password didn't match. Please try again.</p>
{% endif %}
<form method="post" action=".">
<table>
<tr><td><label for="id_username">Username:</label></td><td>{{ form.username }}</td></tr>
<tr><td><label for="id_password">Password:</label></td><td>{{ form.password }}</td></tr>
</table>
<input type="submit" value="login" />
<input type="hidden" name="next" value="{{ next }}" />
</form>
{% endblock %}
.. _forms documentation: ../forms/
.. _site framework docs: ../sites/
Other built-in views
--------------------
In addition to the ``login`` view, the authentication system includes a
few other useful built-in views:
``django.contrib.auth.views.logout``
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
**Description:**
Logs a user out.
**Optional arguments:**
* ``template_name``: The full name of a template to display after
logging the user out. This will default to
``registration/logged_out.html`` if no argument is supplied.
**Template context:**
* ``title``: The string "Logged out", localized.
``django.contrib.auth.views.logout_then_login``
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
**Description:**
Logs a user out, then redirects to the login page.
**Optional arguments:**
* ``login_url``: The URL of the login page to redirect to. This
will default to ``settings.LOGIN_URL`` if not supplied.
``django.contrib.auth.views.password_change``
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
**Description:**
Allows a user to change their password.
**Optional arguments:**
* ``template_name``: The full name of a template to use for
displaying the password change form. This will default to
``registration/password_change_form.html`` if not supplied.
**Template context:**
* ``form``: The password change form.
``django.contrib.auth.views.password_change_done``
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
**Description:**
The page shown after a user has changed their password.
**Optional arguments:**
* ``template_name``: The full name of a template to use. This will
default to ``registration/password_change_done.html`` if not
supplied.
``django.contrib.auth.views.password_reset``
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
**Description:**
Allows a user to reset their password, and sends them the new password
in an email.
**Optional arguments:**
* ``template_name``: The full name of a template to use for
displaying the password reset form. This will default to
``registration/password_reset_form.html`` if not supplied.
* ``email_template_name``: The full name of a template to use for
generating the email with the new password. This will default to
``registration/password_reset_email.html`` if not supplied.
**Template context:**
* ``form``: The form for resetting the user's password.
``django.contrib.auth.views.password_reset_done``
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
**Description:**
The page shown after a user has reset their password.
**Optional arguments:**
* ``template_name``: The full name of a template to use. This will
default to ``registration/password_reset_done.html`` if not
supplied.
``django.contrib.auth.views.redirect_to_login``
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
**Description:**
Redirects to the login page, and then back to another URL after a
successful login.
**Required arguments:**
* ``next``: The URL to redirect to after a successful login.
**Optional arguments:**
* ``login_url``: The URL of the login page to redirect to. This
will default to ``settings.LOGIN_URL`` if not supplied.
Built-in manipulators
---------------------
If you don't want to use the built-in views, but want the convenience
of not having to write manipulators for this functionality, the
authentication system provides several built-in manipulators:
* ``django.contrib.auth.forms.AdminPasswordChangeForm``: A
manipulator used in the admin interface to change a user's
password.
* ``django.contrib.auth.forms.AuthenticationForm``: A manipulator
for logging a user in.
* ``django.contrib.auth.forms.PasswordChangeForm``: A manipulator
for allowing a user to change their password.
* ``django.contrib.auth.forms.PasswordResetForm``: A manipulator
for resetting a user's password and emailing the new password to
them.
* ``django.contrib.auth.forms.UserCreationForm``: A manipulator
for creating a new user.
Limiting access to logged-in users that pass a test
---------------------------------------------------
To limit access based on certain permissions or some other test, you'd do
essentially the same thing as described in the previous section.
The simple way is to run your test on ``request.user`` in the view directly.
For example, this view checks to make sure the user is logged in and has the
permission ``polls.can_vote``::
def my_view(request):
if not (request.user.is_authenticated() and request.user.has_perm('polls.can_vote')):
return HttpResponse("You can't vote in this poll.")
# ...
As a shortcut, you can use the convenient ``user_passes_test`` decorator::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import user_passes_test
def my_view(request):
# ...
my_view = user_passes_test(lambda u: u.has_perm('polls.can_vote'))(my_view)
We're using this particular test as a relatively simple example. However, if
you just want to test whether a permission is available to a user, you can use
the ``permission_required()`` decorator, described later in this document.
Here's the same thing, using Python 2.4's decorator syntax::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import user_passes_test
@user_passes_test(lambda u: u.has_perm('polls.can_vote'))
def my_view(request):
# ...
``user_passes_test`` takes a required argument: a callable that takes a
``User`` object and returns ``True`` if the user is allowed to view the page.
Note that ``user_passes_test`` does not automatically check that the ``User``
is not anonymous.
``user_passes_test()`` takes an optional ``login_url`` argument, which lets you
specify the URL for your login page (``settings.LOGIN_URL`` by default).
Example in Python 2.3 syntax::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import user_passes_test
def my_view(request):
# ...
my_view = user_passes_test(lambda u: u.has_perm('polls.can_vote'), login_url='/login/')(my_view)
Example in Python 2.4 syntax::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import user_passes_test
@user_passes_test(lambda u: u.has_perm('polls.can_vote'), login_url='/login/')
def my_view(request):
# ...
The permission_required decorator
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It's a relatively common task to check whether a user has a particular
permission. For that reason, Django provides a shortcut for that case: the
``permission_required()`` decorator. Using this decorator, the earlier example
can be written as::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import permission_required
def my_view(request):
# ...
my_view = permission_required('polls.can_vote')(my_view)
Note that ``permission_required()`` also takes an optional ``login_url``
parameter. Example::
from django.contrib.auth.decorators import permission_required
def my_view(request):
# ...
my_view = permission_required('polls.can_vote', login_url='/loginpage/')(my_view)
As in the ``login_required`` decorator, ``login_url`` defaults to
``settings.LOGIN_URL``.
Limiting access to generic views
--------------------------------
To limit access to a `generic view`_, write a thin wrapper around the view,
and point your URLconf to your wrapper instead of the generic view itself.
For example::
from django.views.generic.date_based import object_detail
@login_required
def limited_object_detail(*args, **kwargs):
return object_detail(*args, **kwargs)
.. _generic view: ../generic_views/
Permissions
===========
Django comes with a simple permissions system. It provides a way to assign
permissions to specific users and groups of users.
It's used by the Django admin site, but you're welcome to use it in your own
code.
The Django admin site uses permissions as follows:
* Access to view the "add" form and add an object is limited to users with
the "add" permission for that type of object.
* Access to view the change list, view the "change" form and change an
object is limited to users with the "change" permission for that type of
object.
* Access to delete an object is limited to users with the "delete"
permission for that type of object.
Permissions are set globally per type of object, not per specific object
instance. For example, it's possible to say "Mary may change news stories," but
it's not currently possible to say "Mary may change news stories, but only the
ones she created herself" or "Mary may only change news stories that have a
certain status, publication date or ID." The latter functionality is something
Django developers are currently discussing.
Default permissions
-------------------
Three basic permissions -- add, change and delete -- are automatically created
for each Django model that has a ``class Admin`` set. Behind the scenes, these
permissions are added to the ``auth_permission`` database table when you run
``manage.py syncdb``.
Note that if your model doesn't have ``class Admin`` set when you run
``syncdb``, the permissions won't be created. If you initialize your database
and add ``class Admin`` to models after the fact, you'll need to run
``manage.py syncdb`` again. It will create any missing permissions for
all of your installed apps.
Custom permissions
------------------
To create custom permissions for a given model object, use the ``permissions``
`model Meta attribute`_.
This example model creates three custom permissions::
class USCitizen(models.Model):
# ...
class Meta:
permissions = (
("can_drive", "Can drive"),
("can_vote", "Can vote in elections"),
("can_drink", "Can drink alcohol"),
)
The only thing this does is create those extra permissions when you run
``syncdb``.
.. _model Meta attribute: ../model-api/#meta-options
API reference
-------------
Just like users, permissions are implemented in a Django model that lives in
`django/contrib/auth/models.py`_.
.. _django/contrib/auth/models.py: http://code.djangoproject.com/browser/django/trunk/django/contrib/auth/models.py
Fields
~~~~~~
``Permission`` objects have the following fields:
* ``name`` -- Required. 50 characters or fewer. Example: ``'Can vote'``.
* ``content_type`` -- Required. A reference to the ``django_content_type``
database table, which contains a record for each installed Django model.
* ``codename`` -- Required. 100 characters or fewer. Example: ``'can_vote'``.
Methods
~~~~~~~
``Permission`` objects have the standard data-access methods like any other
`Django model`_.
Authentication data in templates
================================
The currently logged-in user and his/her permissions are made available in the
`template context`_ when you use ``RequestContext``.
.. admonition:: Technicality
Technically, these variables are only made available in the template context
if you use ``RequestContext`` *and* your ``TEMPLATE_CONTEXT_PROCESSORS``
setting contains ``"django.core.context_processors.auth"``, which is default.
For more, see the `RequestContext docs`_.
.. _RequestContext docs: ../templates_python/#subclassing-context-requestcontext
Users
-----
The currently logged-in user, either a ``User`` instance or an``AnonymousUser``
instance, is stored in the template variable ``{{ user }}``::
{% if user.is_authenticated %}
<p>Welcome, {{ user.username }}. Thanks for logging in.</p>
{% else %}
<p>Welcome, new user. Please log in.</p>
{% endif %}
Permissions
-----------
The currently logged-in user's permissions are stored in the template variable
``{{ perms }}``. This is an instance of ``django.core.context_processors.PermWrapper``,
which is a template-friendly proxy of permissions.
In the ``{{ perms }}`` object, single-attribute lookup is a proxy to
``User.has_module_perms``. This example would display ``True`` if the logged-in
user had any permissions in the ``foo`` app::
{{ perms.foo }}
Two-level-attribute lookup is a proxy to ``User.has_perm``. This example would
display ``True`` if the logged-in user had the permission ``foo.can_vote``::
{{ perms.foo.can_vote }}
Thus, you can check permissions in template ``{% if %}`` statements::
{% if perms.foo %}
<p>You have permission to do something in the foo app.</p>
{% if perms.foo.can_vote %}
<p>You can vote!</p>
{% endif %}
{% if perms.foo.can_drive %}
<p>You can drive!</p>
{% endif %}
{% else %}
<p>You don't have permission to do anything in the foo app.</p>
{% endif %}
.. _template context: ../templates_python/
Groups
======
Groups are a generic way of categorizing users so you can apply permissions, or
some other label, to those users. A user can belong to any number of groups.
A user in a group automatically has the permissions granted to that group. For
example, if the group ``Site editors`` has the permission
``can_edit_home_page``, any user in that group will have that permission.
Beyond permissions, groups are a convenient way to categorize users to give
them some label, or extended functionality. For example, you could create a
group ``'Special users'``, and you could write code that could, say, give them
access to a members-only portion of your site, or send them members-only e-mail
messages.
Messages
========
The message system is a lightweight way to queue messages for given users.
A message is associated with a ``User``. There's no concept of expiration or
timestamps.
Messages are used by the Django admin after successful actions. For example,
``"The poll Foo was created successfully."`` is a message.
The API is simple:
* To create a new message, use
``user_obj.message_set.create(message='message_text')``.
* To retrieve/delete messages, use ``user_obj.get_and_delete_messages()``,
which returns a list of ``Message`` objects in the user's queue (if any)
and deletes the messages from the queue.
In this example view, the system saves a message for the user after creating
a playlist::
def create_playlist(request, songs):
# Create the playlist with the given songs.
# ...
request.user.message_set.create(message="Your playlist was added successfully.")
return render_to_response("playlists/create.html",
context_instance=RequestContext(request))
When you use ``RequestContext``, the currently logged-in user and his/her
messages are made available in the `template context`_ as the template variable
``{{ messages }}``. Here's an example of template code that displays messages::
{% if messages %}
<ul>
{% for message in messages %}
<li>{{ message }}</li>
{% endfor %}
</ul>
{% endif %}
Note that ``RequestContext`` calls ``get_and_delete_messages`` behind the
scenes, so any messages will be deleted even if you don't display them.
Finally, note that this messages framework only works with users in the user
database. To send messages to anonymous users, use the `session framework`_.
.. _session framework: ../sessions/
Other authentication sources
============================
The authentication that comes with Django is good enough for most common cases,
but you may have the need to hook into another authentication source -- that
is, another source of usernames and passwords or authentication methods.
For example, your company may already have an LDAP setup that stores a username
and password for every employee. It'd be a hassle for both the network
administrator and the users themselves if users had separate accounts in LDAP
and the Django-based applications.
So, to handle situations like this, the Django authentication system lets you
plug in another authentication sources. You can override Django's default
database-based scheme, or you can use the default system in tandem with other
systems.
Specifying authentication backends
----------------------------------
Behind the scenes, Django maintains a list of "authentication backends" that it
checks for authentication. When somebody calls
``django.contrib.auth.authenticate()`` -- as described in "How to log a user in"
above -- Django tries authenticating across all of its authentication backends.
If the first authentication method fails, Django tries the second one, and so
on, until all backends have been attempted.
The list of authentication backends to use is specified in the
``AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS`` setting. This should be a tuple of Python path
names that point to Python classes that know how to authenticate. These classes
can be anywhere on your Python path.
By default, ``AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS`` is set to::
('django.contrib.auth.backends.ModelBackend',)
That's the basic authentication scheme that checks the Django users database.
The order of ``AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS`` matters, so if the same username and
password is valid in multiple backends, Django will stop processing at the
first positive match.
Writing an authentication backend
---------------------------------
An authentication backend is a class that implements two methods:
``get_user(user_id)`` and ``authenticate(**credentials)``.
The ``get_user`` method takes a ``user_id`` -- which could be a username,
database ID or whatever -- and returns a ``User`` object.
The ``authenticate`` method takes credentials as keyword arguments. Most of
the time, it'll just look like this::
class MyBackend:
def authenticate(self, username=None, password=None):
# Check the username/password and return a User.
But it could also authenticate a token, like so::
class MyBackend:
def authenticate(self, token=None):
# Check the token and return a User.
Either way, ``authenticate`` should check the credentials it gets, and it
should return a ``User`` object that matches those credentials, if the
credentials are valid. If they're not valid, it should return ``None``.
The Django admin system is tightly coupled to the Django ``User`` object
described at the beginning of this document. For now, the best way to deal with
this is to create a Django ``User`` object for each user that exists for your
backend (e.g., in your LDAP directory, your external SQL database, etc.) You
can either write a script to do this in advance, or your ``authenticate``
method can do it the first time a user logs in.
Here's an example backend that authenticates against a username and password
variable defined in your ``settings.py`` file and creates a Django ``User``
object the first time a user authenticates::
from django.conf import settings
from django.contrib.auth.models import User, check_password
class SettingsBackend:
"""
Authenticate against the settings ADMIN_LOGIN and ADMIN_PASSWORD.
Use the login name, and a hash of the password. For example:
ADMIN_LOGIN = 'admin'
ADMIN_PASSWORD = 'sha1$4e987$afbcf42e21bd417fb71db8c66b321e9fc33051de'
"""
def authenticate(self, username=None, password=None):
login_valid = (settings.ADMIN_LOGIN == username)
pwd_valid = check_password(password, settings.ADMIN_PASSWORD)
if login_valid and pwd_valid:
try:
user = User.objects.get(username=username)
except User.DoesNotExist:
# Create a new user. Note that we can set password
# to anything, because it won't be checked; the password
# from settings.py will.
user = User(username=username, password='get from settings.py')
user.is_staff = True
user.is_superuser = True
user.save()
return user
return None
def get_user(self, user_id):
try:
return User.objects.get(pk=user_id)
except User.DoesNotExist:
return None
Handling authorization in custom backends
-----------------------------------------
Custom auth backends can provide their own permissions.
The user model will delegate permission lookup functions
(``get_group_permissions()``, ``get_all_permissions()``, ``has_perm()``, and
``has_module_perms()``) to any authentication backend that implements these
functions.
The permissions given to the user will be the superset of all permissions
returned by all backends. That is, Django grants a permission to a user that any
one backend grants.
The simple backend above could implement permissions for the magic admin fairly
simply::
class SettingsBackend:
# ...
def has_perm(self, user_obj, perm):
if user_obj.username == settings.ADMIN_LOGIN:
return True
else:
return False
This gives full permissions to the user granted access in the above example. Notice
that the backend auth functions all take the user object as an argument, and
they also accept the same arguments given to the associated ``User`` functions.
A full authorization implementation can be found in
``django/contrib/auth/backends.py`` _, which is the default backend and queries
the ``auth_permission`` table most of the time.
.. _django/contrib/auth/backends.py: http://code.djangoproject.com/browser/django/trunk/django/contrib/auth/backends.py
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