Overview

TUsers Security Component v2.0 is a set of components especially designed to allow developers to easily implement User Authentication and User Rights Management in applications developed with the Delphi and C++ Builder. The component allows to control the access of the application through a login screen, where the user's name and password are requested. The component verifies if the user is valid and loads their access configurations from the security database, applying the user settings to the application.

[Default Login Screen]

TUsers Security Component is very easy to use. With TUsers in action, you don't even need to write code to have a strong protection covering all the application. Just drop the components in your forms, create the security database (using a utility included in the component package), configure a few properties and your application is then protected.

The component has also several properties, methods and events that allow developers to implement all specific security needs of their applications easily and also very quickly.

TUsers allows to control the access to all the VCL, including buttons, menu items, Actions, DBGrids, Queries, Tables and Dataset Fields . TUsers also works with virtually all the 3rd-party components available on the market.

Tusers v2.x features

TUsers is a very versatile component. Its several features allows to implement from the simplest to the strictest security policy for your applications. Version 2.0 has a series of new features, as follows:

Unique version for several data access component

Now TUsers has a unique version and diverse drivers for each data access component. So you don't need to acquire a TUsers version for each DB Acess component. You just need to use the correct driver for your application. The current version includes drivers for BDE, ADO, IBX, DBX and FireDac. Visit our web site regularly to download other drivers or send us an email requesting the construction of a driver for the data access component you use.

User Administration Module

The admin module shows the security information of the application in a very organized screen and it is very easy to use. It includes several options to make the administration task easier for the security administrator. The User Administration module is a component that encapsulates all the administration functions as well the user interface.

Profile Inheritance

It's a feature that makes user administration more easy. The administrator create a user profile and associate it with a Parent profile. Modify permissions in a profile and copy the changes through the inherited profiles, among other functions.

User can have a different profile for each application

The users of your applications can have a different profile for each application you have. They must be associated with a profile to use an application.

Security settings can be stored locally

Now the user's access configurations can be stored on their computers. This new feature is to eliminate network traffic when the component applies the user security settings in the application forms, as well faster data load. An internal mecanism updates the local information when there are changes in the user security settings.

Standard Profile

The user administrator can choose one of the profiles available in the security database and make it the standard profile for new users in an application. When a new user is created, the standard profile is associated with them.

Automatic Dataset Audit

TUsers allow Automatic Dataset Audit for all datasets which are registered for protection. When a user and a dataset are in Audit Mode, all modifications made by the user are logged by Tusers. If the user edits a record, TUsers will store the original as well the modified values in the record. When the user inserts or delete a record, TUsers will store the original record. The TUsers also allow the developer to restore the original data, but this task needs a little programation effort: you can customize a form and embed it in the user administration module.

Selecting the components you want to protect

The TUsers package has a special component that allows the developer to choose the components which will be protected. The developer just needs to activate the Component Registration Form and check the most relevant components. The developer can also change the caption value, to change the text that will be shown in the User Administration Module. Just drop the TUsersReg component in the forms you want and select the components you want to protect.

[Component Registration Form]

User Administration

TUsers includes a ready to use user administration module. In the version 2.x we have totally redesigned the administration module and now it has a new interface, more modern and easier to use.

The User administration module allows the security administrator to perform all the security control of the applications. The administrator can, for example, add new users and profiles, modify the access permissions and visualize the audit information for a specific user. Only the users who are administrators can have access to the administration module.

The administration module is available as a component, allowing the developer to use it in the application itself or in an independent application designed for this task.

The new user administration is very easy to use and most of the tasks can be performed through the mouse. Granting access rights is made in a more visual fashion. For the access configuration, the administration module shows a list of forms and components of the application and it shows its components in a TTreeView that imitates the hierarchy of the components in the form. The security administrator just needs to click on the desired item to allow or not the user to access that specific component/option.

For each item/component, it is possible to configure full access (Enabled), read only access (Visible, but Disabled) and no access (Invisible). Each status is identified by an icon so that the security administrator can easily know the meaning of the status.

Below we have some screenshots showing the administration module. Click on the miniature to visualize the image in its actual size.

	User Administration Module	User Information	Profile Information	General Application Settings
	Setting permissions to a Profile	Setting permissions at form level	Login/Logout Audit	Current Users

  » Protection of any visual control and Tfields of your application
  » Built-in User's Administration (within your application) or in a separated module.
  » Customization of the Login Screen
  » Audit: trace of the users' Login/Logout and possibility of trace of other activities as record deletion.
  » Security sub-administrators
  » Selection of components for protection within Delphi's IDE
  » Registration of components for protection at runtime.
  » Minimum password size and an event for password validation
  » Maximum number of login attempts
  » Event to synchronize the date of the application and the date from a central computer like the network server or the database server
  » Multi-application
  » User profiles
  » Expiration date for the user
  » Forces users to change password periodically
  » Passwords encrypted and possibility to customize the cryptography routines
  » New user form customization
  » Application Time Out
  » Does not allow multiple logins for a same user name
  » Disables a user after N days without using the application
  » Disables a user after N failed login attemps
  » Easy localization of the component user interface.