Authentication guards in Laravel - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Authentication Guards in Laravel

📖 Scenario: You are building a simple Laravel web app that has two types of users: admins and customers. You want to protect certain pages so only admins can access them, and other pages so only customers can access them.This is like having two different keys for two different rooms in a house. Each key only opens its own room.

🎯 Goal: Build a Laravel app that uses authentication guards to restrict access to routes based on user type.You will create two guards: one for admins and one for customers, then protect routes accordingly.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a users array with admin and customer users

Define two guards: admin and customer

Use middleware to protect routes based on guards

Create routes that only admins or customers can access

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Many web apps have different user roles needing separate login and access control. Authentication guards help manage this cleanly.

💼 Career

Understanding Laravel authentication guards is essential for backend developers working on secure multi-role applications.

1

Create users array with admin and customer roles

Create a PHP array called users with two entries: one with 'username' => 'adminUser' and 'role' => 'admin', and another with 'username' => 'customerUser' and 'role' => 'customer'.

Laravel

<?php

// Create users array with admin and customer
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use a PHP array with two associative arrays inside, each with keys username and role.

2

Define admin and customer guards in config/auth.php

In the config/auth.php file, add two guards inside the 'guards' array: one named 'admin' using 'session' driver and 'admins' provider, and another named 'customer' using 'session' driver and 'customers' provider.

Laravel

 'adminUser', 'role' => 'admin'],
    ['username' => 'customerUser', 'role' => 'customer'],
];

return [
    'guards' => [
        // Add admin and customer guards here
        # Your code here
    ],
    'providers' => [
        // existing providers
    ],
];

Need a hint?

Inside the 'guards' array, add two arrays with keys driver and provider for each guard.

3

Protect routes using admin and customer middleware

In the routes/web.php file, create two routes: /admin/dashboard protected by 'auth:admin' middleware, and /customer/profile protected by 'auth:customer' middleware. Each route should return a simple string like 'Admin Dashboard' or 'Customer Profile'.

Laravel

 'adminUser', 'role' => 'admin'],
    ['username' => 'customerUser', 'role' => 'customer'],
];

return [
    'guards' => [
        'admin' => [
            'driver' => 'session',
            'provider' => 'admins',
        ],
        'customer' => [
            'driver' => 'session',
            'provider' => 'customers',
        ],
    ],
    'providers' => [
        // existing providers
    ],
];

// routes/web.php

use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Route;

// Add routes with auth middleware here
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use Route::get with a closure returning a string, and add ->middleware('auth:admin') or ->middleware('auth:customer').

4

Complete providers for admins and customers

In the config/auth.php file, add two providers inside the 'providers' array: one named 'admins' using 'eloquent' driver and App\Models\Admin::class as model, and another named 'customers' using 'eloquent' driver and App\Models\Customer::class as model.

Laravel

 'adminUser', 'role' => 'admin'],
    ['username' => 'customerUser', 'role' => 'customer'],
];

return [
    'guards' => [
        'admin' => [
            'driver' => 'session',
            'provider' => 'admins',
        ],
        'customer' => [
            'driver' => 'session',
            'provider' => 'customers',
        ],
    ],
    'providers' => [
        // Add admins and customers providers here
        # Your code here
    ],
];

// routes/web.php

use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Route;

Route::get('/admin/dashboard', function () {
    return 'Admin Dashboard';
})->middleware('auth:admin');

Route::get('/customer/profile', function () {
    return 'Customer Profile';
})->middleware('auth:customer');

Need a hint?

Inside 'providers', add two arrays with keys driver and model for admins and customers.