Authenticate ASP.NET user session with javascript

Question

That standard demos for ASP.NET MVC 3 web site user managements include the following login process:

1. User enters auth data.
2. Data is posted to the server.
3. Code that handles authentication attempts checks provided data with DB.
4. If everything is OK - calls FormsAuthentication.SetAuthCookieto set the cookies for the upcomming session requests from the browser.
5. And redirects user to whereever.

I want to implement a purely jQuery.Ajax - ASP.NET logon mechanism.

I can call MVC site actions from js with no problem. But how do I get this FormsAuthentication.SetAuthCookie cookie data to manually, from JS code put them in a browser cookie store? How do I extract them on the server or in jQuery.ajax success code?

Answer 1

Using MVC 3 you can set an onclick event for your Login button and then send and ajax POST to the logon action. Have the Logon action return a JSON result and control where the user is sent from your javascript function.

[HttpPost]
public JsonResult LogOn(LogOnModel model, string returnUrl)
{
    if (ModelState.IsValid)
    {
        //Do your authentication
        FormsAuthentication.SetAuthCookie(model.UserName, model.RememberMe);
        return Json(true);
    }

// If we got this far, something failed, redisplay form
    return Json(false);
}

In your View add an Id to your form and put a click handler on the button.

<% using (Html.BeginForm("LogOn", "Account", FormMethod.Post, new { Id = "frmLogOn" }))
   { %>
    <%: Html.ValidationSummary(true, "Login was unsuccessful. Please correct the errors and try again.")%>
    <div>
        <fieldset>
            <legend>Account Information</legend>

            <div class="editor-label">
                <%: Html.LabelFor(m => m.UserName)%>
            </div>
            <div class="editor-field">
                <%: Html.TextBoxFor(m => m.UserName)%>
                <%: Html.ValidationMessageFor(m => m.UserName)%>
            </div>

            <div class="editor-label">
                <%: Html.LabelFor(m => m.Password)%>
            </div>
            <div class="editor-field">
                <%: Html.PasswordFor(m => m.Password)%>
                <%: Html.ValidationMessageFor(m => m.Password)%>
            </div>

            <div class="editor-label">
                <%: Html.CheckBoxFor(m => m.RememberMe)%>
                <%: Html.LabelFor(m => m.RememberMe)%>
            </div>

            <p>
                <input type="submit" value="Log On" onclick="clicked(); return false;" />
            </p>
        </fieldset>
    </div>
<% } %>
<script type="text/javascript">
    function clicked() {
        var form = $('#frmLogOn');
        $.ajax({
            type: 'POST',
            url: '/Account/LogOn',
            data: form.serializeObject(),
            success: function (result) {
                if (result == true) {
                    alert("success");
                    window.top.location = "/Home/Index";
                }
                else {
                    alert("failure");
                }
            },
            error: function (data) {
                alert("error");
            }
        });
    }
</script>