Django oDesk

Requirements

• python-odesk

Authentication

Quick start

Before you may use oDesk APIs, you will need to obtain your pair of API keys. Visit the oDesk API Center documentation for full details.

Include django_odesk.auth.urls to your urls.py:

(r'^odesk_auth/', include('django_odesk.auth.urls')),

Use an URL of django_odesk.auth.views.callback as your app's callback URL. Usually it would be something like this:

http://www.myapp.com/odesk_auth/callback/

You will also need to store your pair of oDesk API keys in settings.py:

ODESK_PUBLIC_KEY = '(your public key)'
ODESK_PRIVATE_KEY = '(your private key)'

Most probably you will want to use model-based authentication (the default), that works with django's built-in User model. To do so, add the django_odesk.auth.backends.ModelBackend to your AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS setting:

AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS = (
    'django.contrib.auth.backends.ModelBackend',
    'django_odesk.auth.backends.ModelBackend',
)

You will also need to enable both SessionMiddleware and AuthenticationMiddleware:

MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES = (
    'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware',
    # ...
)

Using authentication

To make the user authenticate with oDesk account, point them to the django_odesk.auth.views.authenticate view, like:

/odesk_auth/authenticate/

That will send the user to odesk.com site for authentication, and log them in upon redirecting back.

The user will be asked to log-in at odesk.com, if they are not already, and to authorize your app, if they use it for the first time.

By default, the new User instance will be created for each unknown user. If you want to change this, use the ODESK_CREATE_UNKNOWN_USER setting:

ODESK_CREATE_UNKNOWN_USER = False

By default, the is_staff and is_superuser attributes are both set to False for a new user. You can change this (and other aspects of user creation) by subclassing the django_odesk.auth.backends.ModelBackend and overwriting the configure_user method. However, for a simple cases there is a shortcut: use the ODESK_ADMINS and ODESK_SUPERUSERS lists in settings.py:

ODESK_ADMINS = ('[email protected]','[email protected]')
ODESK_SUPERUSERS = ('[email protected]',)

Those users will get admin or superuser rights, respectively. These settings only have effect on user creation.

To authenticate the user manualy, use django.contrib.auth.authenticate() with a token keyword argument.

Limiting access

Use the same methods for limiting access, as you would with built-in authentication.

As with Django's built-in authentication, you need to provide a login page yourself. To make users authenticate with oDesk, you could add line like this to your login.html template:

Log in with oDesk account <a href="{% url django_odesk.auth.views.authenticate %}?next={{ next }}">here</a>

For simple cases you may just set login page to the django_odesk.auth.views.authenticate, like this:

LOGIN_URL = '/odesk_auth/authenticate/'

Authentication without a database

If for some reason you don't want to use Django's User model or the database layer at all, you can still use oDesk authentication. All you need to change is an authentication backend. Use SimpleBackend instead of ModelBackend:

AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS = (
    'django_odesk.auth.backends.SimpleBackend',
)

Note

Please note that this type of authentication still relies on django.contrib.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware, although it does not require django.contrib.auth to be added to the INSTALLED_APPS

When user authenticates, the request.user will be a special object with an interface similar to that of django.contrib.auth.models.User You may use it much in a way you would use Django's User object:

>>> request.user.username
'[email protected]'
>>> request.user.first_name
'Oleksiy'
>>> request.user.is_authenticated()
True

Default values for "security-related" attributes are:

>>> request.user.is_active
True
>>> request.user.is_staff
False
>>> request.user.is_superuser
False

The settings ODESK_ADMINS and ODESK_SUPERUSERS may be used to change those values for specified users. The ODESK_CREATE_UNKNOWN_USER setting obviously has no effect.

Note

Please note that, even though you can check for is_staff status, you cannot use the database-less authentication to access the built-in admin. It relies on the database and the built-in User model too heavily.

Clients

There are two convenient subclasses of odesk.Client which can save you some typing.

django_odesk.core.clients.DefaultClient is already pre-populated with oDesk API keys from your settings.py file. So you can use it like this:

from django_odesk.core.clients import DefaultClient

client = DefaultClient() #Not authenticated

# Or

client = DefaultClient('your_api_token') #Authenticated
client.team.get_teamrooms()

django.core.clients.RequestClient is a subclass of DefaultClient, which takes a request parameter. It uses a token from the session and it should be used in conjunction with django_odesk.auth:

from django_odesk.core.clients import RequestClient

def my_view(request):
    client = RequestClient(request) #Already authenticated
    client.team.get_teamrooms()
    # ...

If you plan to use odesk API calls extensively in your views, there is another shortcut, the django_odesk.core.middleware.RequestClientMiddleware. It populates request with odesk_client attribute, which is an instance of RequestClient:

MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES = (
    'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware',
    # ...
    'django_odesk.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware',
    'django_odesk.core.middleware.RequestClientMiddleware',
)

Then you may use the client in your views:

def my_view(request):
    request.odesk_client.team.get_teamrooms()
    # ...