What is User Authentication?

[MUSIC] 0:00 Welcome to User Authentication with Express and Mongo DB. 0:04 In this course, I'll show you how to add a user sign up and log in form to a website. 0:08 This will let you password protect parts of a site and 0:13 limit access for only those visitors who have an account and are signed in. 0:16 And when you know who's signed in, you'll be able to customize the experience for 0:21 each of your site's visitors. 0:25 You're probably pretty used to creating accounts and logging into websites. 0:27 Maybe use social media sites like Facebook and 0:30 Twitter, e-commerce sites like Amazon or entertainment applications like Netflix. 0:33 They all require you to create an account with a username and password and 0:38 usually a bunch of other information, like your email home address and so on. 0:42 After you create an account, you use the service by logging into the site. 0:47 You type your username and password into a log in form. 0:51 This provides credentials to the web server to prove you are who you say you 0:55 are, once you're logged in or authenticated you can access pages and 0:58 information that other people can't like your Amazon order history or 1:03 direct messages on Twitter. 1:06 In fact, you're experiencing user authentication right now 1:08 here on Treehouse. 1:12 You had to sign up to join Treehouse, and you had to log in to access this course. 1:13 Because you're authenticated, we know who you are. 1:19 We can display your name, your picture, and 1:22 the number of points you've earned as a Treehouse student. 1:23 We know which course you're taking, and what video you'll be watching next. 1:26 And we can recommend other courses and 1:30 workshops based on what you've already watched here. 1:32 Authentication has two benefits. 1:36 First, it provides password protection to hide content from unauthorized users. 1:38 For example, only students who are logged in get to view this video and 1:43 take this course. 1:47 But more importantly, authentication lets us customize the learning experience for 1:48 you, because we know you're the one who's logged into this page right now. 1:53 Pretty cool, right? 1:58 To get the most from these lessons, you should be familiar with Node, 1:59 npm, Express, and Mongo, and have taken the prerequisites for this course. 2:03 See the teacher's notes on this page for 2:07 links to the courses you should have taken before this one. 2:09 Okay, let's get started. 2:12