I should point out that the argument to authen->protected_runmodes() in this example is a regex, but it could be.. a list of the names of the runmodes that should be protected.

What this plugin does is.. In setup, you define that for example 'home' is the starting point. You set up that 'home' is also a protected runmode, so when a request comes in, they are automatically redirected to runmode login (that you can choose not to code, there's one put in there for you by the beautiful Authentication plugin).

The answer to your question is in the docs, I know they are tedious to read, print it out and look it over, it may help (that's what I do from time to time). There are examples of using Authen I believe on cpan also.

Don't give up on using this module if you are having troubles, it took me a little bit to figure out too, and it's been a real time saver.