Thanks Jay -
After reading
def confirm_password?(password)
return false unless password_hash && salt
self.password_hash == hash_password(password, salt)
end
in user.rb
the following works for straight ruby validation
user = User.find_by_email('some.email.address')
user.confirm_password?'valid-password'
=> true
I was experimenting with a .htaccess file for a server and I was looking for a way to validate a username / password through discourse for that server without knowing the passwords to generate the .htaccess file. The SSO approach is better and knowing how to validate a user name / password without using SSO will be useful for me.