Getting Started with Authlance

Authlance bundles authentication, licensing, and customizable dashboards into a single cohesive platform. This guide walks you through the core ideas, explains how the different packages fit together, and points you to the next steps for configuring your own environment.

Overview

Authlance uses production ready open source components to handle identity, session management (Ory Kratos and Ory Hydra). The platform is made up of three main parts:

  1. Auth Container: The identity gateway that manages user authentication, session handling, and integrates with external identity providers.
  2. License Operator: The backend service that codifies your product catalog, entitlements, and auditing rules. (Optional or standalone)
  3. Authlance Framework: A set of libraries and tools to build custom dashboards, workflows, and integrations on top of the core platform.

Prerequisites

To be able to run or develop with Authlance, you will need:

  • An https certificate either for local development or production deployment.
  • Authlance publishes NATs messages for transactional email, Authlance provides a PostMark integration, however, you can implement your own email transaction handler by listening to NATs.
  • For development, docker-compose. For production, Kubernetes or Docker Swarm.
  • A stripe account.
  • A S3-compatible storage for file uploads (MinIO, AWS S3, etc.)
  • An authlance account so that can request trial licenses.

Development React Authlance Dashboard

To start extending the Authlance Dashboard and building custom dashboards, you will need the following:

  1. Node 20.x and Yarn 1.x installed.
  2. Python 3.9+ installed.
  3. Docker and docker-compose installed.
  4. The scaffolding project from the authlance/loop-scaffold repository.
  5. Run the docker-compose with our core services authlance/deployment.

How to Use These Docs

This guide groups documentation by platform component:

  • Auth Container explains the identity gateway, session handling.
  • License Operator describes the automation layer that codifies entitlements, product catalogs, and auditing.
  • Authlance Dashboard focuses on extending the dashboard with new UI, routes, or backend integrations.
  • Development covers setting up a local environment, contributing to the codebase.
  • Deployment covers Docker Compose, Helm charts, and supporting infrastructure.

Each section mixes conceptual overviews with hands-on procedures so you can move from experimentation to production confidently.