accounts_system.md

Accounts System Documentation

The store requires an accounts system to work. And the page needs to communicate with the server accross platforms.

The Sign In/Up Page Events

The sign in and sign up pages always send event messages to the opener of the window. No other window is allowed to to interfer with the opened communication session between the sign in/up window and its opener.

This communication session is done using the messages browser APIs (postMessage and onmessage). The messages that are sent by the sign in/up page include one object. This object contains a data variable, and a type variable. The type variable specifiys the type of the event. All the available event types are:

• loaded - Fires when the window APIs are loaded
• closed - Fires when the window APIs are loaded
• failed - Fires when an error occures in the sign in/up page
• signed-in - Fires when the user has successfully signed in to their account
• authenticated - Fires when the user authenticates the request

Note that the maximum duration of a communication session is 4 minutes for each page/redirect!

The accounts.api Library

You can use the accounts.api library to communicate with the accounts system! The accounts.api library adds a new object to the page, with the name of accountsSystemAPI.

The openRequest function

You can use the openRequest function to open a sign in request. You can pass the configurations object to customise the page to fit your app, or to specify the data that your app requires access to.

window.accountsSystemAPI.openRequest({

    //...

});

The onFailure event function

The function you assign to the onFailure variable will always be called when an error occures in the sign in window.

The onConnected event function

The function you assign to the onConnected variable will always be called when the sign in window has successfully been opened and loaded.

window.accountsSystemAPI.onConnected = function(){

    alert("Connected!");

};

The onClose event function

The function you assign to the onClose variable will always be called when the sign in window gets closed.

window.accountsSystemAPI.onClose = function(event){

    alert("Closed!");

};

The onSignIn event function

The function you assign to the onSignIn variable will always be called when the user has successfully signed in to their account.

Note that this does not mean you can access to the user's data. The user needs to authenticate your request first!

window.accountsSystemAPI.onSignIn = function(event){

    alert("Signed In!");

};

The onAuth event function

The function you assign to the onAuth variable will always be called when the user authenticates your request.

It's always better to wait for this function to get called, unless the origin of your server turns out to be the same as the server's. (In which case, you'd already have access to the user's data)

window.accountsSystemAPI.onAuth = function(event){

    alert("Authenticated!");

};