#An Node/Express Example of JWT (JSON Web Tokens)

This simple application is designed to demonstrate the principle of using JWT (JSON Web Tokens) as access tokens to protect an API.

For an overview of how it all works, read the tutorial - to follow shortly.

##Pre-requisites

Obviously you'll need Node and npm, and you also need MongoDB installed and running.

##Installing and Setting Up

Install the project dependencies:

npm install

Ensure Mongod is running, and seed the database:

node seed.js

This will create a single user:

Username: bob

Password: password

##Using It

To use it without a client application, use something like Postman, for Chrome or Poster, for Firefox.

Run the application:

node app.js

To get a token, make a GET request to:

http://localhost:3000/token

You'll need to set the headers:

username : bob

password : password

Make a note of the access token in the returned JSON.

Now try making a GET request to the following URL:

http://localhost:3000/secret

You should get a 401 Not Authorized.

However, if you set the access token; either as a GET parameter access_token or a header called x-access-token you should see the following:

Hello bob

That' it!