CYPEX Academy - Application Authentication Section

4.1 Authentication section overview

The user list shows which logins are possible and which ones are not. You can add users to the scenario and configure the authentication method.

You can also use LDAP as a backend technology to handle authentication. Note that LDAP is ONLY used for authentication – in case you add new users to LDAP, CYPEX doesn’t know and won’t respond. You must add the new user to CYPEX in order for it to function properly.

Authentication Section Overview Video

4.2 Managing internal user accounts

In order to log into CYPEX, you must have a valid user set to active. Create such users in the admin panel. Identify users with an email address or with the “username”. Use either string to log into the system. The username is optional.

Mapping to users and roles

Usernames and email addresses are mapped to database users. It’s possible to map many email addresses / usernames to the same database role. The goal is to use PostgreSQL side roles as groups to assign the same permissions to various CYPEX front-end users. In most cases, this is quite useful. As an example of a real-world scenario, 100 bookkeepers identified by email might be mapped to the same server-side user.

4.3 Manage roles

Note that while it is possible to create roles, we’ll expand this feature in the future to make it more powerful to allow for the definition of more parameters and settings. For now, simply follow the instructions to create a role.

4.4 Login settings

Modify the standard login screen in the “Login Settings” within the “Authentication” section on the admin panel. Currently, you can change two parameters: The logo and the title of the page. While changing the text is easy, changing the logo requires a bit more explanation: The logo you want to use has to be in the public folder of the web server. Otherwise, CYPEX won’t find the image.

4.5 Login using the LDAP server

Configuring LDAP in the graphical user interface (admin panel) is not sufficient. You need to enable some settings in the editor as well. First you need to enable LDAP in the CYPEX container. Do that by opening the “.env” file and set LDAP=on. Then update the container by running make up-d.

Once this is done, you can proceed with the graphical interface and insert your LDAP information. LDAP will then serve as a full replacement for other authentication methods.

4.6 Repository configuration

You can use Git repositories to allow users to add extensions to CYPEX data models. Configuring the repositories will allow CYPEX to clone them and present the list of available extensions graphically so that deployments are easy.

Before you save, test the connection– use the button on the screen.

4.7 Explore repository content and install applications

CYPEX identifies the application repositories by a file called “description.json”. The file turns a repository into an application repository. Here’s a sample that shows what this file might look like:

The structure of this file is relatively simple. CYPEX generates it when it interacts with the repository.

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