Build Secure Login for Your Angular App
Single page applications (SPAs) are becoming more and more popular. Their appeal is obvious. Fast loading times gives users the feeling of responsiveness even over slow networks. At some point, a developer of a SPA has to think about authentication and authorization. But what do these two terms actually mean? Authentication deals with ensuring that a user truly is who they claim to be. This usually involves a login page in which the user provides...
If It Ain't TypeScript It Ain't Sexy
A few years ago I got “Jeep fever.” I began daydreaming about owning a Jeep, driving around with the top down, and going on trips into the mountains. That’s when it happened. Everywhere I went, I saw Jeeps. I passed countless Jeeps on the road. There were Jeeps in every parking lot. Practically everyone had a Jeep but me. Where did all these Jeeps come from?! Logically, I had to assume there was relatively the...
Build Your First Azure Function in Visual Studio Code
Inevitably it happens. You go to one of those bars that has three trillion beers on tap, and you stare hopelessly at the wall of taps trying to decide what to order. Panic no more! Hop Roulette is here to save you from embarrassment when the bartender asks, “What’ll it be?” Hop Roulette is a simple Azure Function that returns a random beer from an API. What use is this? It gives me a fun...
Create Login and Registration in Your ASP.NET Core MVC App
User authentication and authorization are common features in web applications, but building these mechanics has the potential to take a lot of time. Doing so requires setting up persistent storage for user information (in some type of database) and paying keen attention to potential security issues around sensitive operations like hashing passwords, password reset workflows, etc. - weeks of development time begin to add up before we ever get to the functionality that delivers value...
Go for liftoff at Okta!
T-minus 3… 2… 1… I’m blasting my way into the Developer Relations world like Alice discovering Wonderland and its fantastic cast of characters. I am so curious, and excited, and all of the feels that come with coming to Okta! Officially stepping into the Developer Avocado (er… pardon me, Advocate) role and bringing the love of .NET, voice and IOT to the party. Who is this Lady Nerd? Well, for starters I am obsessed with...
Create and Verify JWTs in PHP with OAuth 2.0
JSON Web Tokens (JWTs) allow you to implement stateless authentication (without the use of server-side sessions). JWTs are digitally signed with a secret key and can contain various information about the user: identity, role, permissions, etc in JSON format. This information is simply encoded and not encrypted. However, because of the digital signature, the payload cannot be modified without access to the secret key. JWTs are a relatively hot topic as they are widely used...
Data Persistence with Hibernate and Spring
Java developers typically encounter the need to store data on a regular basis. If you’ve been developing for more than 15 years, you probably remember the days of JDBC in Java. Using JDBC can be tedious if you don’t like writing SQL. Not only that, but there’s nothing in JDBC that helps you create your database. Hibernate came along and changed everything by allowing you to map POJOs (plain ol’ Java objects) to database tables....
Build Your First PWA with Angular
During the last two years, everybody started talking about Progressive Web Applications, or PWAs for short. But what is this new type of application, and how can it make your life as an Angular developer better? To understand what PWAs are all about, and how you can build them in Angular, let’s consider the following scenario. You are out and about in an area with little or no network reception. You are using a cool...
Pro Tips for Developer Relations
I’ve been a professional developer advocate for a little over two years. I started out at Stormpath, and six months later, I leapt at the opportunity to do the same thing at Okta. I say "professional" because even though I’ve been a technical speaker since 2004, I never got paid for it. During my first year (2017) at Okta, I traveled and spoke a lot. A lot being more than I’d ever traveled and spoken...
Nobody Cares About OAuth or OpenID Connect
If you’re reading this post, there’s a good chance that you’re a web developer who’s very interested in web security. You’ve probably heard about OAuth or OpenID Connect (OIDC) before. You may have even used them at some point in your career. But here’s the thing: almost nobody actually cares about OAuth or OIDC. Not you, not me, and not even other developers in the security industry. To understand why nobody cares about these two...