authelia/docs/features.md

# Features in details

## First factor using a LDAP server

**Authelia** uses an LDAP server as the backend for storing credentials.
When authentication is needed, the user is redirected to the login page which
corresponds to the first factor. **Authelia** tries to bind the username and
password against the configured LDAP backend.

You can find an example of the configuration of the LDAP backend in
[config.template.yml].

<p align="center">
  <img src="../images/first_factor.png" width="400">
</p>


## Second factor

**Authelia** comes with three kind of second factor.

* Security keys like [Yubikey]. More info [here](./2factor/security-key.md).
* One-Time Passwords generated by [Google Authenticator]. More info [here](./2factor/time-based-one-time-password.md).
* Duo Push Notifications to use with [Duo mobile application](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.duosecurity.duomobile&hl=en) available on Android, iOS and Windows. More info [here](./2factor/duo-push-notifications.md).

<p align="center">
  <img src="../images/use-another-method.png" width="400">
</p>

## Password reset

With **Authelia**, you can also reset your password in no time. Click on the 
**Forgot password?** link in the login page, provide the username of the user
requiring a password reset and **Authelia** will send an email a confirmation
email to the user email address.

Proceed with the password reset form and validate to reset your password.

<p align="center">
  <img src="../images/reset_password.png" width="400">
</p>

## Access Control

With **Authelia**, you can define your own access control rules for finely
restricting user access to some resources and subdomains. Those rules are
defined and fully documented in the configuration file. They can apply to
users, groups or everyone.

Check out [config.template.yml] to see how they are defined.

## Single factor authentication

**Authelia** allows you to customize the authentication method to use for each 
subdomain. The supported methods are either "single_factor" or "two_factor". 
Please check [config.template.yml] to see an example of configuration.

It is also possible to use [basic authentication] to access a resource 
protected by a single factor.

Please note that Authelia uses the *Proxy-Authorization* header and not
*Authorization* since one might be willing to authenticate against both
Authelia and the proxy. For instance you can use the following command to
access your service:

    curl -H "Proxy-Authorization: Basic am9objpwYXNzd29yZA==" https://myservice.example.com"

## Session management with Redis

When your users authenticate against Authelia, sessions are stored in a
Redis key/value store. You can specify your own Redis instance in
[config.template.yml].

[basic authentication]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_access_authentication
[config.template.yml]: https://github.com/clems4ever/authelia/blob/master/config.template.yml
[Yubikey]: https://www.yubico.com/products/yubikey-hardware/yubikey4/
[Google Authenticator]: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.authenticator2&hl=en