What methods and mechanisms are used in Django to implement user authentication?

In Django, user authentication is implemented using the built-in django.contrib.auth application. The main mechanisms and methods:

• User Model: the standard user model with fields for name, password, email, etc.
• Authentication: the authenticate(request, username, password) function checks the correctness of the entered data and returns a user object or None.
• Login: the login(request, user) function saves user information in the session.
• Logout: the logout(request) function removes user data from the session.
• Middleware: AuthenticationMiddleware adds the user object to each request (request.user).

Example of usage:

from django.contrib.auth import authenticate, login

def my_view(request):
    username = request.POST['username']
    password = request.POST['password']
    user = authenticate(request, username=username, password=password)
    if user is not None:
        login(request, user)
        # User successfully logged in
    else:
        # Invalid credentials

You can also use ready-made forms and views from django.contrib.auth.views to simplify the work.