Creating an account with a username - ruby-on-rails

Question

I have followed the devise wiki to enable username login with devise (instead of email). But I can't figure out how to enable username signup/registration with devise.
I have changed my registration view to prompt for a first and last name and a password.
app/views/devise/registrations/new.html.erb:
<h3>Sign up</h3>
<%= form_for(resource, :as => resource_name, :url => registration_path(resource_name)) do |f| %>
<%= devise_error_messages! %>
<div><%= f.label :firstname, "First Name", :autofocus => true %><br />
<script type="text/javascript">window.onload = function() {document.getElementById('user_firstname').focus();}</script>
<%= f.text_field :firstname %></div>
<div><%= f.label :lastname, "Last Name", :autofocus => true %><br />
<%= f.text_field :lastname %></div>
<div><%= f.label :password %><br />
<%= f.password_field :password %></div>
<div><%= f.label :password_confirmation %><br />
<%= f.password_field :password_confirmation %></div>
<div><%= f.submit "Sign up" %></div>
<% end %>
<%= render :partial => "devise/shared/links" %>
I've edited my model to generate a username from the first and last name:
app/models/user.rb
class User < ActiveRecord::Base
# Include default devise modules. Others available are:
# :token_authenticatable, :encryptable, :confirmable, :lockable, :timeoutable and :omniauthable
devise :database_authenticatable, :registerable, :recoverable, :rememberable, :trackable, :validatable, :authentication_keys => [:username]
# Setup accessible (or protected) attributes for your model
#attr_accessor :username
validates_presence_of :firstname, :lastname, :unique => true
after_validation :createUsername
attr_accessible :username, :password, :password_confirmation, :remember_me, :firstname, :lastname
#attr_protected :password
def createUsername
# create username from first-last name
firstnamePart=self.firstname[0,1].downcase
lastnamePart=self.lastname[0,5].downcase
username=lastnamePart + firstnamePart
count=0
while username.length != 7
username=username + count.to_s
count +=1
end
self.username=username
#verify username uniqueness?
end
def self.find_first_by_auth_conditions(warden_conditions)
conditions = warden_conditions.dup
if login = conditions.delete(:login)
where(conditions).where(["lower(username) = :value OR lower(email) = :value", { :value => login.downcase }]).first
else
where(conditions).first
end
end
end
But when I try to sign up I get the following error. Text will have to do because I don't have enough 'reputation' to post images:
Sign up
1 error prohibited this user from being saved:
Email can't be blank
so, devise is still looking for an email during the signup/registration phase. I assume I have to edit devise's controller but that didn't get installed in the following commands
rails g devise:install
rails g devise user
rails g devise:views
So my rails app is probably using a default devise controller (/usr/local/rvm/gems/ruby-2.0.0-p195/gems/devise-1.5.4/app/controllers/devise/registrations_controller.rb) but I didn't see any references to 'email' in there.
How do I change devise to accept a username during signup/registration? Any help would greatly be appreciated.

Answer 1

Looks like you discard email at all in your login system. That's quite different from the Devise article which still have email attribute but use uername to login only.
Before fixing the issue, double think it. This is REALLY NOT A GOOD PRACTICE.
Most of the common Devise modules relying on email won't work, confirmable, password recovery, password confirmation etc. Do you really want that? What if an user lost password and recover? No way in this system!
There is no way you can inform users any important notice in your app, say a major TOS change.
You are inviting spam in your system.

Answer 2

Did you "Modify config/initializers/devise.rb to have:"
config.authentication_keys = [ :username ]