---
title: Blossom the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the angels
teaser:
tags: web,rails,clearance
author: Dan Croak
published_on: 2009-08-16
---

> "Silently, one by one, in the infinite meadows of Heaven,
> Blossom the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the angels."
> [Evangeline](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evangeline) by Henry Wadsworth
> Longfellow

You're writing a Rails app. You want users to be able to [sign
in](https://thoughtbot.com/blog/post/159805420/sign-up-sign-in-sign-out).

You decide to use [Clearance](http://github.com/thoughtbot/clearance).

How do you expect it to handle "remember me" out of the box?

## Remember unchecked by default

Basecamp:

![Basecamp](http://images.thoughtbot.com/ui/2009-7-8-basecamp_username.png)

Gmail:

![Gmail](http://images.thoughtbot.com/ui/2009-7-8-gmail.png)

## Remember me checked by default

Eventbrite:

![Eventbrite](http://s3.amazonaws.com/thoughtbot-training/images/remember_eventbrite.png)

## No remember me, automatically sets a cookie

Github:

![Github](http://s3.amazonaws.com/thoughtbot-training/images/remember_github.png)

Tumblr:

![Tumblr](http://s3.amazonaws.com/thoughtbot-training/images/remember_tumblr.png)

## What should an authentication framework prefer

Right now, Clearance comes with remember unchecked by default. I'm leaning
towards changing it to checked by default.

What do you think?