Making a secure web application or adding the functionality for authentication is daunting. You have to consider all aspects of the authentication process. This includes the privacy and security of the user and much more. With Laravel, adding these authentication features is highly simplified. Laravel has built-in tools and features that makes it easy for Laravel development companies and developers to integrate authentication with ease.
Authentication means identifying the person trying to login into any web application through name, ID, and password. Simply put, it’s like entering a secure place which you can enter only if you have the right credentials.
Integrating authentication is a seamless process, as it has in-built tools and features. At its core, guard, and providers are two essential concepts that help manage and configure the authentication process.
Guard is the concept of handling the authentication users per request. It determines the authentication method for every user and how to verify it.
Laravel comes with various types of guards to handle different requests. For example, “session guard” is the default guard, responsible for storing data like cookies and identifying and authenticating the user based on the session data.
Meanwhile, providers in Laravel authentication are responsible for retrieving and validating user information from the data source, such as a database. Providers work with guards to retrieve the user's credentials and perform the necessary authentication process. With Eloquent, the process of retrieving data easily.
It is equipped with tools and features designed to improve the developer’s efficiency, resulting in providing faster and more secure solutions.
Now let’s understand how you can configure Laravel Authentication
Now let’s understand how you can configure the easy Laravel authentication. A basic configuration process comes with a few simple steps:
To create a new Laravel project, simply open your CMD prompt and run the given command below.
composer create-project --prefer-dist laravel/laravel your-project-name
Now, open ‘.env’ file in the root directory of your Laravel project, and set up the database variables, for example, DB_DATABASE, DB_USERNAME, and DB_PASSWORD.
Running migration is necessary for Laravel, as it creates the required tables in your database. Just run the code “php artisan migrate“ to start the process.
After migration, generate authentication scaffolding to generate the necessary views, controllers, and routes for authentication. Simply run “php artisan make:auth” in your terminal to create the authentication scaffolding.
Open the "config/auth.php" file. This file allows you to configure authentication settings, including guards and providers. By default, Laravel's configuration should be set up correctly for session-based authentication.
To protect routes, open the “app/Http/Kernel.php” file and locate the “$routeMiddleware” array. Ensure that the "auth" middleware is present, as it verifies if a user is authenticated. Use “auth” middleware for the routes that require authentication.
It’s done. You have configured the authentication in Laravel. Now you can test the authentication by adding and registering new users logging in.
Note that this is just the basic overview of configuring authentication. As per your requirement, you can hire laravel developer or hire remote developers to further customize and improve your application that includes a highly secure authentication feature.
