UserLogin - User/Session Management

This package handles session management in the typical Web way: user logs in, a session key is generated and dropped as a cookie on the hard drive. Susbsequent requests use that session key to validate the user. Logging out destroys this session key.

UserLogin gives you a hash of session data (name/value pairs) that stays the same throughout the user's session (time between logging in/logging out). Each user has his own similar data which you can retrieve using the package, as well. All this information is stored in the database and cached by UserLogin for faster access.

The system is configured via the database, and system-wide parameters can be easily read and changed from Perl (this allows you to use the system-wide stuff for your own system-wide variables).

UserLogin works with Mason, straight Perl, and (theoretically) CGI.

This package is licensed under the same terms as Mason itself. (The Artistic license.)

SourceForge Stuff

Kindly hosted by

SourceForge is kind of confusing, so here's a list of the places you probably want to go.

• Download: The latest releases are here. We simultaneously release them at Mason HQ.
• Mailing List: You can subscribe or look at archives here. This is your Best Hope for help. We don't bite, try us :)
• Bugs: Click "Submit New" to submit a bug.
• Feature Requests: Click "Submit New" to submit a feature request.
• CVS: For brave souls. We actually try to keep the releases pretty up to date, so you shouldn't have to use this unless you have a problem or you want to help us test.

Changes

Features

• Ease of use (no customization necessary except in autohandler, It Just Works (TM))
• Handles session and user information in hashes that are tied to the database
• Handles logging in/out and registering
• Simple, customizable permission checking (who can view this page)
• Allows full customization of all HTML that shows up
• Caches information for faster access
• Configurable (configuration in database)
• Works with Postgres (easily extensible to other databases)
• Does *not* use Apache::Session, but session interface is the same
• Store Perl hashes and arrays in user and session variables (yay!)
• Works with Mason (yay)

Basic session management info:

• If you're not logged in, an anonymous session will be automatically created
• Login and register can happen anywhere, even in the middle of a transaction, and control will be passed to the page that was called after the session is created. (Useful in sites where you want people not to have to log in until the last minute, so as not to discourage them from buying things, for example.)
• Logging in copies all session variables from anonymous session to the user's sessoin.
• Logging out (or logging in to a different user) does *not* copy session variables over so that you can't get somebody's information, even inadvertently.
• When session times out, a login page is displayed and once the user logs in, the page will continue as normal.

Installation

The system is separated into two parts: the base Perl library (which Mason calls to do most of the user and session data handling) and the Mason library and SQL.

Perl library

tar xzvf UserLogin-0.6.tar.gz
cd UserLogin-0.6
perl Makefile.PL
make
make install

SQL

cd sql
setup-postgres.pl <your db name>

Sample App

1. Put all files from mason into a directory that will run Mason.
2. Modify all instances of /~john/userlogin in autohandler to the path of your directory from the browser.
3. Try it out and have fun!