ActiveModel::Serializers VS bcrypt-ruby

Hey folks, I've been using FastJsonapi::ObjectSerializer in past projects, but it is now deprecated and it's successor is "in maintenance mode! ". The og serializer had no release since 2015.

Further reading: Active Model Serializers Github

In order to use our serializers, first we must install the gem into our gem file. we can do that by first grabbing our "Active Model Serializers" gem file from "https://rubygems.org/gems/active_model_serializers/versions/0.10.13". We will copy the gem from this website and paste it into our gem file in our application like so

Today I thought I'd run through a few of the powerful things that the ActiveModel::Serializer gem brings to the table when used in a Ruby on Rails application. Sure, there are faster alternatives, but AMS is the first one I learned how to use, and thus it holds a special place in my heart. Quick question before we dive too much deeper, though...

AMS

ActiveModelSerializers to build JSON views

Might be overkill for your situation but I generally use https://github.com/rails-api/active_model_serializers for my projects. Otherwise just build the hash you are sending back to the frontend with standard code.

On the other hand, we have Active Model Serializers. This gem is also deprecated but has another stable version 0.10. I also found Blueprinter gem. I've never used it before and don't know its limitations.

Easy as that. We store a password hash and salt, we need Bcrypt in our app to ensure our password take bazillion years to crack if someone attempts to do it.

The BCrypt Gem

Instead, you should use something like the bcrypt gem to prompt users to enter a password to encrypt/decrypt their saved passwords.

These are the three steps to get your passwords protected. I hoped this helped in clearing up any confusion you may have had about encrypting passwords! If you missed it, here is the link to bcrypt!

BCrypt is a hefty gemfile that uses hashes and salts to encrypt passwords in your database. Hashes are a fixed-length value that will always produce the same output for the same given input. The output can be a 32-bit or 64-bit number. What BCrypt does, is add a salt to this hash, which is an additional 29-bit number that generates a new salt every time you login with your password. This method makes it incredibly difficult to hack into the database to reveal the actual password to a user.

BCrypt Gem Open Source Documentation

Once a hash is generated, we need to be able to store it to be compared for authentication purposes. The source code of the BCrypt Ruby Gem actually offers great insight into how this is performed in Rails:

The bcrypt gem to improve password security in tandem with the ActiveRecord has_secure_password feature

Github Documentation

We will be taking advantage of the bcrypt gem. Make sure you include this in your Gemfile and check out the GitHub if you want to learn more about the process of garbling a password (hashing and salting).