Quick Start¶
There are some complete (but simple) examples available in the examples directory of the Flask-Security repo.
Note
The below quickstarts are just that - they don’t enable most of the features (such as registration, reset, etc.). They basically create a single user, and you can login as that user… that’s it. As you add more features, additional packages (e.g. Flask-Mailman, Flask-Babel, qrcode) might be required and will need to be added to your requirements.txt (or equivalent) file. Flask-Security does some configuration validation and will output error messages to the console for some missing packages.
Note
The sqlalchemy based quickstarts all use the pre-packaged models - because, well, that’s the quickest and easiest way to get started. There is NO REQUIREMENT that your application use these - as long as the required fields are in your models.
Note
The default SECURITY_PASSWORD_HASH
is “argon2” - so be sure to install argon2_cffi.
If you opt for a different hash e.g. “bcrypt” you will need to install the appropriate package.
Danger
The examples below place secrets in source files. Never do this for your application especially if your source code is placed in a public repo. How you pass in secrets securely will depend on your deployment model - however in most cases (e.g. docker, lambda) using environment variables will be the easiest.
Basic Flask-SQLAlchemy Application¶
Flask-SQLAlchemy Install requirements¶
$ python3 -m venv pymyenv
$ . pymyenv/bin/activate
$ pip install flask-security[fsqla,common]
Flask-SQLAlchemy Application¶
The following code sample illustrates how to get started as quickly as possible using Flask-SQLAlchemy and the built-in model mixins.
import os
from flask import Flask, render_template_string
from flask_sqlalchemy import SQLAlchemy
from flask_security import Security, SQLAlchemyUserDatastore, auth_required, hash_password
from flask_security.models import fsqla_v3 as fsqla
# Create app
app = Flask(__name__)
app.config['DEBUG'] = True
# Generate a nice key using secrets.token_urlsafe()
app.config['SECRET_KEY'] = os.environ.get("SECRET_KEY", 'pf9Wkove4IKEAXvy-cQkeDPhv9Cb3Ag-wyJILbq_dFw')
# Generate a good salt for password hashing using: secrets.SystemRandom().getrandbits(128)
app.config['SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT'] = os.environ.get("SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT", '146585145368132386173505678016728509634')
# have session and remember cookie be samesite (flask/flask_login)
app.config["REMEMBER_COOKIE_SAMESITE"] = "strict"
app.config["SESSION_COOKIE_SAMESITE"] = "strict"
# Use an in-memory db
app.config['SQLALCHEMY_DATABASE_URI'] = 'sqlite://'
# As of Flask-SQLAlchemy 2.4.0 it is easy to pass in options directly to the
# underlying engine. This option makes sure that DB connections from the
# pool are still valid. Important for entire application since
# many DBaaS options automatically close idle connections.
app.config["SQLALCHEMY_ENGINE_OPTIONS"] = {
"pool_pre_ping": True,
}
app.config["SQLALCHEMY_TRACK_MODIFICATIONS"] = False
# Create database connection object
db = SQLAlchemy(app)
# Define models
fsqla.FsModels.set_db_info(db)
class Role(db.Model, fsqla.FsRoleMixin):
pass
class User(db.Model, fsqla.FsUserMixin):
pass
# Setup Flask-Security
user_datastore = SQLAlchemyUserDatastore(db, User, Role)
security = Security(app, user_datastore)
# Views
@app.route("/")
@auth_required()
def home():
return render_template_string("Hello {{ current_user.email }}")
# one time setup
with app.app_context():
# Create User to test with
db.create_all()
if not security.datastore.find_user(email="test@me.com"):
security.datastore.create_user(email="test@me.com", password=hash_password("password"))
db.session.commit()
if __name__ == '__main__':
app.run()
You can run this either with:
flask run
or:
python app.py
Basic Flask-SQLAlchemy-Lite Application¶
Flask-SQLAlchemy Install requirements¶
This requires python >= 3.10:
$ python3 -m venv pymyenv
$ . pymyenv/bin/activate
$ pip install flask-security[common] sqlalchemy flask-sqlalchemy-lite
Flask-SQLAlchemy-Lite Application¶
The following code sample illustrates how to get started as quickly as possible using Flask-SQLAlchemy-Lite and the built-in model mixins. Note that Flask-SQLAlchemy-Lite is a very thin wrapper above sqlalchemy.orm and just provides session and engine initialization. Everything else is pure sqlalchemy (unlike Flask-SQLAlchemy).
import os
from sqlalchemy.orm import DeclarativeBase
from flask import Flask, render_template_string
from flask_sqlalchemy_lite import SQLAlchemy
from flask_security import Security, FSQLALiteUserDatastore, auth_required, hash_password
from flask_security.models import sqla as sqla
# Create app
app = Flask(__name__)
app.config['DEBUG'] = True
# Generate a nice key using secrets.token_urlsafe()
app.config['SECRET_KEY'] = os.environ.get("SECRET_KEY", 'pf9Wkove4IKEAXvy-cQkeDPhv9Cb3Ag-wyJILbq_dFw')
# Generate a good salt for password hashing using: secrets.SystemRandom().getrandbits(128)
app.config['SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT'] = os.environ.get("SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT", '146585145368132386173505678016728509634')
# have session and remember cookie be samesite (flask/flask_login)
app.config["REMEMBER_COOKIE_SAMESITE"] = "strict"
app.config["SESSION_COOKIE_SAMESITE"] = "strict"
# Use an in-memory db
app.config |= {
"SQLALCHEMY_ENGINES": {
"default": {"url": "sqlite:///:memory:", "pool_pre_ping": True},
},
}
# Create database connection object
db = SQLAlchemy(app)
# Define models
class Model(DeclarativeBase):
pass
# NOTE: call this PRIOR to declaring models
sqla.FsModels.set_db_info(base_model=Model)
class Role(Model, sqla.FsRoleMixin):
__tablename__ = "role"
pass
class User(Model, sqla.FsUserMixin):
__tablename__ = "user"
pass
# Setup Flask-Security
user_datastore = FSQLALiteUserDatastore(db, User, Role)
security = Security(app, user_datastore)
# Views
@app.route("/")
@auth_required()
def home():
return render_template_string("Hello {{ current_user.email }}")
# one time setup
with app.app_context():
# Create User to test with
Model.metadata.create_all(db.engine)
if not security.datastore.find_user(email="test@me.com"):
security.datastore.create_user(email="test@me.com", password=hash_password("password"))
db.session.commit()
if __name__ == '__main__':
app.run()
You can run this either with:
flask run
or:
python app.py
Basic SQLAlchemy Application with session¶
SQLAlchemy Install requirements¶
This requires python >= 3.10:
$ python3 -m venv pymyenv
$ . pymyenv/bin/activate
$ pip install flask-security[common] sqlalchemy
SQLAlchemy Application (w/o Flask-SQLAlchemy)¶
The following code sample illustrates how to get started as quickly as possible using SQLAlchemy in a declarative way:
This example shows how to split your application into 3 files: app.py, database.py and models.py.
- app.py
import os from flask import Flask, render_template_string from flask_security import Security, current_user, auth_required, hash_password, \ SQLAlchemySessionUserDatastore, permissions_accepted from database import db_session, init_db from models import User, Role # Create app app = Flask(__name__) app.config['DEBUG'] = True # Generate a nice key using secrets.token_urlsafe() app.config['SECRET_KEY'] = os.environ.get("SECRET_KEY", 'pf9Wkove4IKEAXvy-cQkeDPhv9Cb3Ag-wyJILbq_dFw') # Generate a good salt for password hashing using: secrets.SystemRandom().getrandbits(128) app.config['SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT'] = os.environ.get("SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT", '146585145368132386173505678016728509634') # Don't worry if email has findable domain app.config["SECURITY_EMAIL_VALIDATOR_ARGS"] = {"check_deliverability": False} # manage sessions per request - make sure connections are closed and returned app.teardown_appcontext(lambda exc: db_session.close()) # Setup Flask-Security user_datastore = SQLAlchemySessionUserDatastore(db_session, User, Role) security = Security(app, user_datastore) # Views @app.route("/") @auth_required() def home(): return render_template_string('Hello {{current_user.email}}!') @app.route("/user") @auth_required() @permissions_accepted("user-read") def user_home(): return render_template_string("Hello {{ current_user.email }} you are a user!") # one time setup with app.app_context(): init_db() # Create a user and role to test with security.datastore.find_or_create_role( name="user", permissions={"user-read", "user-write"} ) db_session.commit() if not security.datastore.find_user(email="test@me.com"): security.datastore.create_user(email="test@me.com", password=hash_password("password"), roles=["user"]) db_session.commit() if __name__ == '__main__': # run application (can also use flask run) app.run()
- database.py
from sqlalchemy import create_engine from sqlalchemy.orm import scoped_session, sessionmaker from sqlalchemy.ext.declarative import declarative_base from flask_security.models import sqla engine = create_engine('sqlite:////tmp/test.db') db_session = scoped_session(sessionmaker(autocommit=False, autoflush=False, bind=engine)) Base = declarative_base() # This creates the RolesUser table and is where # you would pass in non-standard tables names. sqla.FsModels.set_db_info(base_model=Base) def init_db(): # import all modules here that might define models so that # they will be registered properly on the metadata. Otherwise # you will have to import them first before calling init_db() import models Base.metadata.create_all(bind=engine)
- models.py
from database import Base from flask_security.models import sqla as sqla class Role(Base, sqla.FsRoleMixin): __tablename__ = 'role' class User(Base, sqla.FsUserMixin): __tablename__ = 'user'
You can run this either with:
flask run
or:
python app.py
Basic MongoEngine Application¶
MongoEngine Install requirements¶
$ python3 -m venv pymyenv
$ . pymyenv/bin/activate
$ pip install flask-security[common] mongoengine
MongoEngine Application¶
The following code sample illustrates how to get started as quickly as possible using MongoEngine (of course you have to install and start up a local MongoDB instance).
import os
from flask import Flask, render_template_string
from mongoengine import Document, connect
from mongoengine.fields import (
BinaryField,
BooleanField,
DateTimeField,
IntField,
ListField,
ReferenceField,
StringField,
)
from flask_security import Security, MongoEngineUserDatastore, \
UserMixin, RoleMixin, auth_required, hash_password, permissions_accepted
# Create app
app = Flask(__name__)
app.config['DEBUG'] = True
# Generate a nice key using secrets.token_urlsafe()
app.config['SECRET_KEY'] = os.environ.get("SECRET_KEY", 'pf9Wkove4IKEAXvy-cQkeDPhv9Cb3Ag-wyJILbq_dFw')
# Generate a good salt for password hashing using: secrets.SystemRandom().getrandbits(128)
app.config['SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT'] = os.environ.get("SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT", '146585145368132386173505678016728509634')
# Don't worry if email has findable domain
app.config["SECURITY_EMAIL_VALIDATOR_ARGS"] = {"check_deliverability": False}
# Create database connection object
db_name = "mydatabase"
db = connect(alias=db_name, db=db_name, host="mongodb://localhost", port=27017)
class Role(Document, RoleMixin):
name = StringField(max_length=80, unique=True)
description = StringField(max_length=255)
permissions = ListField(required=False)
meta = {"db_alias": db_name}
class User(Document, UserMixin):
email = StringField(max_length=255, unique=True)
password = StringField(max_length=255)
active = BooleanField(default=True)
fs_uniquifier = StringField(max_length=64, unique=True)
confirmed_at = DateTimeField()
roles = ListField(ReferenceField(Role), default=[])
meta = {"db_alias": db_name}
# Setup Flask-Security
user_datastore = MongoEngineUserDatastore(db, User, Role)
security = Security(app, user_datastore)
# Views
@app.route("/")
@auth_required()
def home():
return render_template_string("Hello {{ current_user.email }}")
@app.route("/user")
@auth_required()
@permissions_accepted("user-read")
def user_home():
return render_template_string("Hello {{ current_user.email }} you are a user!")
# one time setup
with app.app_context():
# Create a user and role to test with
security.datastore.find_or_create_role(
name="user", permissions={"user-read", "user-write"}
)
if not security.datastore.find_user(email="test@me.com"):
security.datastore.create_user(email="test@me.com",
password=hash_password("password"), roles=["user"])
if __name__ == '__main__':
# run application (can also use flask run)
app.run()
Basic Peewee Application¶
Peewee Install requirements¶
$ python3 -m venv pymyenv
$ . pymyenv/bin/activate
$ pip install flask-security[common] peewee
Peewee Application¶
The following code sample illustrates how to get started as quickly as possible using Peewee.
import os
from flask import Flask, render_template_string
from playhouse.flask_utils import FlaskDB
from peewee import *
from flask_security import Security, PeeweeUserDatastore, \
UserMixin, RoleMixin, auth_required, hash_password
# Create app
app = Flask(__name__)
app.config['DEBUG'] = True
# Generate a nice key using secrets.token_urlsafe()
app.config['SECRET_KEY'] = os.environ.get("SECRET_KEY", 'pf9Wkove4IKEAXvy-cQkeDPhv9Cb3Ag-wyJILbq_dFw')
# Generate a good salt for password hashing using: secrets.SystemRandom().getrandbits(128)
app.config['SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT'] = os.environ.get("SECURITY_PASSWORD_SALT", '146585145368132386173505678016728509634')
app.config['DATABASE'] = {
'name': 'example.db',
'engine': 'peewee.SqliteDatabase',
}
# Create database connection object
db = FlaskDB(app)
class Role(RoleMixin, db.Model):
name = CharField(unique=True)
description = TextField(null=True)
permissions = TextField(null=True)
# N.B. order is important since db.Model also contains a get_id() -
# we need the one from UserMixin.
class User(UserMixin, db.Model):
email = TextField()
password = TextField()
active = BooleanField(default=True)
fs_uniquifier = TextField(null=False)
confirmed_at = DateTimeField(null=True)
class UserRoles(db.Model):
# Because peewee does not come with built-in many-to-many
# relationships, we need this intermediary class to link
# user to roles.
user = ForeignKeyField(User, related_name='roles')
role = ForeignKeyField(Role, related_name='users')
name = property(lambda self: self.role.name)
description = property(lambda self: self.role.description)
def get_permissions(self):
return self.role.get_permissions()
# Setup Flask-Security
user_datastore = PeeweeUserDatastore(db, User, Role, UserRoles)
security = Security(app, user_datastore)
# Views
@app.route('/')
@auth_required()
def home():
return render_template_string("Hello {{ current_user.email }}")
# one time setup
with app.app_context():
# Create a user to test with
for Model in (Role, User, UserRoles):
Model.drop_table(fail_silently=True)
Model.create_table(fail_silently=True)
if not security.datastore.find_user(email="test@me.com"):
security.datastore.create_user(email="test@me.com", password=hash_password("password"))
if __name__ == '__main__':
app.run()
Mail Configuration¶
Flask-Security integrates with an outgoing mail service via the mail_util_cls
which
is part of initial configuration. The default class flask_security.MailUtil
utilizes the
Flask-Mailman package. Be sure to add flask_mailman to
your requirements.txt. The older and no longer maintained package Flask-Mail
is also (still) supported.
The following code illustrates a basic setup, which could be added to the basic application code in the previous section:
# At top of file
from flask_mailman import Mail
# After 'Create app'
app.config['MAIL_SERVER'] = 'smtp.example.com'
app.config['MAIL_PORT'] = 587
app.config['MAIL_USE_TLS'] = True
app.config['MAIL_USERNAME'] = 'username'
app.config['MAIL_PASSWORD'] = 'password'
mail = Mail(app)
To learn more about the various Flask-Mailman settings to configure it to work with your particular email server configuration, please see the Flask-Mailman documentation.
Proxy Configuration¶
The user tracking features need an additional configuration in HTTP proxy environment. The following code illustrates a setup with a single HTTP proxy in front of the web application:
# At top of file
from werkzeug.middleware.proxy_fix import ProxyFix
# After 'Create app'
app.wsgi_app = ProxyFix(app.wsgi_app, x_for=1)
To learn more about the ProxyFix
middleware, please see the
Werkzeug documentation.
Unit Testing Your Application¶
As soon as you add any of the Flask-Security decorators to your API endpoints, it can be frustrating to unit test your basic routing (and roles and permissions). Without getting into the argument of the difference between unit tests and integration tests - you can approach testing in 2 ways:
‘Pure’ unit test - mocking out all lower level objects (such as the data store)
Complete app with in-memory/temporary DB (with little or no mocking).
Look in the Flask-Security repo examples directory for actual code that implements the second approach which is much simpler and with an in-memory DB fairly fast.
You also might want to set the following configurations in your conftest.py:
app.config["WTF_CSRF_ENABLED"] = False
# Our test emails/domain isn't necessarily valid
app.config["SECURITY_EMAIL_VALIDATOR_ARGS"] = {"check_deliverability": False}
# Make this plaintext for most tests - reduces unit test time by 50%
app.config["SECURITY_PASSWORD_HASH"] = "plaintext"