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Subject: Re: Problems with AuthKit (was: Django or Pylons - comparison 
	details)
From: James Gardner <ja...@pythonweb.org>
To: pylons-discuss <pylons-discuss@googlegroups.com>
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Hi Raul,

Just to add to what Dalius has said...

> > a) the author or authkit is never around

I am occasionally ;-)

> > b) authkit is way over complicated

Agreed, but authentication and authorisation *is* complicated and
there are lots of different use cases.

> > c) autukit sucks in other ways
> > d) all of the above.

???

> This is unfortunately very true. I looked at AuthKit for possible
> inclusion in a project of mine, but it's complicated in areas it
> doesn't need to be, very basic in other areas, and not very flexible.
> In the end I wrote my own authorisation and authentication system.

AuthKit tries to be a flexible basis for your own system. Sometimes it
is easier to create your own system than to base it on AuthKit, I
don't have a problem with that.

> These are the things I wanted in my auth+auth system:
> - Customisable table names
> - Users, Roles and Permissions
> - Hide/show menu items pulled from the DB, based on permissions
> - Enable/disable links, based on permissions
> - Hide/show sections of pages, based on permissions
> - User access to pages/methods, based on permissions
> - Fairly simple access checking

AuthKit can help with all these things apart from Customisable table
names but it doesn't provide a GUI admin system which seems to be what
you are after?

> I haven't gotten the "access to pages/methods" going yet (not 100%
> sure how to implement it yet), but I have the rest of the stuff
> working.
>
> Some of the reasons why I couldn't use AuthKit:
> - Users/Groups far too limited (no "permissions")
> - No way to show/hide page elements based on permissions
> - No way to show/hide menu items pulled from the DB based on permissions
> - Too rigid

That's not really true is it? Have you seen this:
http://authkit.org/svn/AuthKit/trunk/authkit/permissions.py

There are permissions for all sorts of things to do with roles,
groups, IP addresses, time of day etc etc. The permissions system is
designed in such a way that you can create your own permissions too if
the defaults don't fit your needs.

% if authorized(RemoteUser()):
    <a href="/signed_in">Click here</a>.
% else:
    <a href="/not_signed_in">Click here</a>.

Good luck with your implementation anyway.

Cheers,

James