# Login\_engine - auth against email rather that username? **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [January 2, 2006, 5:15pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/login-engine-auth-against-email-rather-that-username/55846 "2006-01-02T17:15:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e47c2d/32.png) [@tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tomtt)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2006, 5:15pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/login-engine-auth-against-email-rather-that-username/55846/1 "2006-01-02T17:15:26Z")
Hi all, Short of hacking the code apart, is there a method making the login\_engine authenticate against email address rather than username? I find that people rarely remember usernames, and would prefer to use email addresses as the identifier. Thanks! Tom ---
**Author:** ![tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e47c2d/32.png) [@tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tomtt)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2006, 5:15pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/login-engine-auth-against-email-rather-that-username/55846/2 "2006-01-02T17:15:35Z")
Simple fix would be to remove the email field from the app/view/signup.rhtml and rename the username field to email in the text. What they put into the username field doesn’t much make a difference, as long as it is a string. -Nb ```auto Nathaniel S. H. Brown http://nshb.net ``` ---
**Author:** ![tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e47c2d/32.png) [@tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tomtt)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2006, 5:15pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/login-engine-auth-against-email-rather-that-username/55846/3 "2006-01-02T17:15:43Z")
I think you have do a couple more things because the user model won’t validate if a login is not provided. I just re-included the LoginEngine::AuthenticatedUser module in my User model and commented out the following lines: # We aren’t using the login and need to comment it out # validates\_presence\_of :login, :on =\> :create # validates\_length\_of :login, :within =\> 3…40, :on =\> :create # validates\_uniqueness\_of :login, :on =\> :create Cheers, Derek On 1/2/06, Nathaniel S. H. Brown [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > ```auto > > Hi all, > > > > ``` – Derek H. HighGroove Studios - [http://www.highgroove.com](http://www.highgroove.com) Atlanta, GA Keeping it Simple. 404.593.4879 ---
**Author:** ![tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e47c2d/32.png) [@tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tomtt)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2006, 6:55pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/login-engine-auth-against-email-rather-that-username/55846/4 "2006-01-02T18:55:20Z")
Hello Tom ! 2006/1/2, Tom T. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid): > Short of hacking the code apart, is there a method making the > login\_engine authenticate against email address rather than username? I simply added a before\_validation filter that copies the email field to the username field. Then, I lenghtened the login field to accomodate E-Mails. Hope that helps ! ---
**Author:** ![tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e47c2d/32.png) [@tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tomtt)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2006, 7:28pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/login-engine-auth-against-email-rather-that-username/55846/5 "2006-01-02T19:28:01Z")
This is all probably indicative of a need to distinguish the ‘user profile’ information (name, birthday, favourite colour) from the actual authentication information (id & password/phrase). Perhaps the real way forward is either/or/both of: a) removing the extraneous information (currently the name and email\*) from the authentication system, and b) giving developers a fairly intuitive means of defining their own validations on the id field - or a means of selecting between a few existing ones (login, email address, something else…) The stealth-launched new site ([http://rails-engines.org](http://rails-engines.org)) has a link to the Trac system. Someone submit a ticket, close your eyes and click the heels of your ruby slippers three times, and perhaps it might get done 😉 - james - note that removing the guarantee that one field will contain a valid email address means that email notification has to be reworked too. ---
**Author:** ![tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e47c2d/32.png) [@tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tomtt)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2006, 8:24pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/login-engine-auth-against-email-rather-that-username/55846/6 "2006-01-02T20:24:27Z")
Tom T. wrote: > Short of hacking the code apart, is there a method making the > login\_engine authenticate against email address rather than username? Hi all, Thanks for your responses. I’ve managed to make it work by just simply changing most instances of the ‘login’ variable to ‘email’ and removing/tweaking the validation lines. The code isn’t very complex, and a bit of following it all through did me some good. In a future version, a flag in the config would be ideal, allowing you to auth against whatever field you wanted. Login\_engine is great work though - saved me a lot of time writing my own system! Thanks again, Tom ---
**Author:** ![tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e47c2d/32.png) [@tomtt](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/tomtt)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2006, 12:10am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/login-engine-auth-against-email-rather-that-username/55846/7 "2006-01-03T00:10:04Z")
I was not inferring that he delete the login column and field, rather to remove the email field and use the login field for both the email and username. I see under the validation that you would likely have to extend the length\_of below for the login field to more adequately compensate for the longer email addresses. You still want to ensure that the email is unique, present, So I suggest only modifying the following line in LoginEngine::Authenticated to the following. ``` validates_length_of :login, :within => 5..255, :on => :create ``` Regards, Nathaniel. ```auto Nathaniel S. H. Brown http://nshb.net ```