Ember authentication with Oauth server/client - authentication

Question

I am trying to design the authentication flow of an Ember application with a Rails backend. I basically want to authenticate users via Google/Facebook/etc., I do not want to provide an 'independent' authentication service. I do want to maintain a list of users of course on the server side, potentially merging different authentications from different sources into the same user. I will not interact on behalf of the user on Google/Facebook from the client side, but I will do that on the server side.
For the above reason I was planning to do the following:
I will use torii to fetch an auth_token on the client side and I will pass that onto the server side, where I will validate it, convert it into an access token.
I will generate a custom token on the server side which I will send back to the client and require all further API calls to be accompanied by that token. I will not share the access token with the client at all.
Would you say that this is an optimal flow?
In terms of implementation, I have been able to get auth_tokens from the different providers using the example here. I am completely unsure however:
if I need ember-simple-auth or only torii (how do these two complement each other?)
how do I pass the auth token to the server side? With the code below I can get the auth token, but is this the proper place to implement the call to the API?
export default Ember.Route.extend({
actions: {
googleLogin: function() {
var _this = this;
this.get('session').authenticate('simple-auth-authenticator:torii', 'google-oauth2').then(
function() {console.log(_this.get('session.secure.authorizationCode'));}
);
return;
},
facebookLogin: function() {
this.get('session').authenticate('simple-auth-authenticator:torii', 'facebook-oauth2');
return;
}
}
});
how do I make all further requests to the API to be accompanied by a specific token?
should I use devise on the server side to make it easier or not?

Answer 1

I have been implemented exactly the same kind of workflow.
I used ember-simple-auth with ember-simple-auth-torii and implemented a custom authenticator to achieve this goal.
Ember-simple-auth provides an example of a custom authenticator here .
Your custom authenticator implementation will look like the following
First get auth_token using torii
Then valid this auth_token against your backend in order to get your custom token
Your authenticate callback in your custom authenticator will basically look like the following :
authenticate: function(provider, options) {
var self = this;
return new Ember.RSVP.Promise(function(resolve, reject) {
self.torii.open(provider, options || {}).then(function(data) {
var endpoint = '/token'; // Your API endpoint used to get your cutom token
var dataToSend = { // Data sent to your endpoint
grant_type: 'authorization_code',
code: data.accessToken,
access_token: data.accessToken
};
$.post(endpoint, dataToSend).done(function(response) {
response.provider = provider;
resolve(data);
}).fail(function(response) {
response.provider = provider;
reject(data);
})
}, reject)
})
}
Once you have the custom authenticator initilized you can use it this way on your controllers :
this.get('session').authenticate(
'authenticator:customauthenticator', // Or wathever name you gave
'facebook-connect' // Any compatible torii provider
).then(function(user) {
console.log(user); // Will display ajax response from your endpoint
})
Finally, if you want your custom token to be automatically sent with all ajax request, you can use the ember-simple-auth oauth2-bearer authorizer.