Perform an authenticated keystone.js / GraphQL API query

Question

I am new to Keystone.js and GraphQL. So far I have been able to successfully execute the following API queries (taken from this page) via a POST request:

const SIGNIN = `mutation signin($identity: String, $secret: String) {
  authenticate: authenticateUserWithPassword(email: $identity, password: $secret) {
    item {
      id
      name
    }
  }
}`;

// Returns id and name of authenticated user

and

const GET_ALL_POSTS = `query GetPosts {
  allPosts {
    name
    id
  }
}`;

// Returns id and name of all posts (if no access controls)

If I set access controls for the list Post I get an access error from the second query as expected, but I can't work how to then perform an authenticated query for allPosts, e.g. I want:

• To (programatically) authenticate a user by their email and password
• If successful, run a query for allPosts and return the results

What am I doing wrong?

Answer 1

The answer is to first submit the query below, to authenticate your user and generate an access token:

query: `mutation ($identity: String, $secret: String) {
  authenticate: authenticateUserWithPassword(email: $identity, password: $secret) {
    token
  }
}`

Subsequent queries are then authenticated by adding the provided token to your headers of your request with:

'Authorization: Bearer <token>'.

Further information here.

More generally, the GraphQL playground is well worth a look for anyone getting into keystonejs and new to GraphQL.