JWTs are a common method for authentication on the web. See how to implement an auth flow from scratch in a Node.js + Vue.js app.

JWT, an acronym for JSON Web Token, is an open standard that allows developers to verify the authenticity of pieces of information called claims via a signature. This signature can either be a secret or a public/private key pair. Together with the header and the payload, they can be used to generate or construct a JWT, as we will get to see later.

JWTs are commonly used for authentication or to safely transmit information across different parties. Here’s a common flow for JWT-based authentication systems: once a user has logged into an app, a JWT is created on the server and returned back to the calling client.

Each subsequent request will include the JWT as an authorization header, allowing access to protected routes and resources. Also, once the backend server verifies the signature is valid, it extracts the user data from the token as required. Note that in order to ensure a JWT is valid, only the party holding the keys or secret is responsible for signing the information.

In this post, we will be focusing on using JWT to perform authentication requests on a Vue.js client app with a Node.js backend. But first, let’s review how JWT works in a nutshell.

#vue #node #jwt #javascript #web-development