Decorator for authenticating token based API calls

# views.py

from django.http import HttpResponseForbidden
from django.contrib.auth.tokens import default_token_generator
from django.contrib.auth import authenticate, login


try: 
    from functools import wraps
except ImportError:
    from django.utils.functional import wraps # Python 2.4 fallback

# Decorator for using API with normal auth vs token
def logged_in_or_token(view_func):
    @wraps(view_func)
    def _wrapped_view(request, *args, **kwargs):
        if request.user.is_authenticated():
            return view_func(request, *args, **kwargs)
        if 'token' in request.REQUEST and \
            'user' in request.REQUEST:
                user = authenticate(pk=request.REQUEST['user'], token=request.REQUEST['token'])
                if user:
                    login(request, user)
                    return view_func(request, *args, **kwargs)
        return HttpResponseForbidden()
    return _wrapped_view


# backends.py

from django.contrib.auth.models import User
from django.contrib.auth.backends import ModelBackend
from django.contrib.auth.tokens import default_token_generator

class TokenBackend(ModelBackend):
    def authenticate(self, pk, token):
        try:
            user = User.objects.get(pk=pk)
        except User.DoesNotExist:
            return None
        if default_token_generator.check_token(user, 
            token): 
            return user
        return None