If you get authentication wrong, it can cost you your reputation, or worse – your livelihood.
Queue the screeching record sound. Maybe that’s a bit too dramatic… But hear me out.
Authentication is complicated.
As a developer, you keep hearing techno-jargon like OAuth, SAML, and OpenID Connect and you feel like a noob (or even quite nervous) because you don’t know the first thing about them. Heck, when you started at your job, user authentication was already in place!
It's just usernames and passwords right?
In order to implement authentication right, it’s crucial you have a basic understanding of why these technologies help keep user data safe.
Using a strategy like the popular explain it like I’m five (ELI5) technique, you can easily wrap your head around extremely complex concepts very quickly by relating them to concepts already familiar to you.
If you liked my earlier ELI5-style essays (here or here), you’ll love this.
Sign up and get this four part email series containing simple, easy-to-understand, and brief essays clearly describing the most popular modern authentication techniques including OAuth, SAML, and OpenID Connect.
Finally make sense of these concepts from the ground level so you can feel like the competent developer you know you are.