I wrote about openID a couple of weeks ago, and have been looking for a project to give it a try. A new departmental publication website, with the primary audience external, seems like a good place to start. The site itself is being build in WordPress, so I grabbed a copy of the OpenID plug-in and set it up.
And while the plug-in works fine, the openID implementations don’t seem quite ready for prime time. At first I thought I’d try my Yahoo account as a log-in, knowing that Yahoo has started an OpenID service. It turns out (after getting a login failure) that I first needed to enable OpenID for my account. Then (after another failed login attempt) it turns out you just enter the domain address yahoo.com to link to OpenID. So after I figured out all that it was OK, but that is more than the average person is going to put up with. Other OpenID implementations seem to have slightly different processes.
A cool aspect of the WordPress plug-in is it also lets your site function as an OpenID provider. For a big site, with a lot of users (like maybe a university blogging system?) this would be a great service to offer users. But again right now it is a little fussy. The address you need to reference is different from the others (domain/authors/loginID) and the one site I tried it with ALMOST worked but then I got a php error in the last step.
None of this is to say that OpenID isn’t worth the trouble — far from it. Nor should you wait to start working with it. Just don’t expect too much just yet…
One of the criticisms of OpenID’s usability is the reliance on URLs for identifiers since people seem more comfortable identifying themselves by their email address. To remedy this problem, emailtoid was established to offer a simple but robust means for turning email addresses into fully qualified OpenID URLs.
Once an account has been created on Emailtoid associating an email addresses with an existing OpenID (AOL, WordPress, etc), supporting relying parties can accept email addresses as identifiers without needing to ask for passwords.
Once you have created a myOpenID account you’ll want to actually use it somewhere. Most likely you already have a website in mind, but if not then check out the directory or try the links below. We’ll pretend we are logging into an OpenID enabled service on pibb.com
Are you tired of creating a new account on every website you use? Do you avoid new websites because they come with yet another username and password? Do you paste stickies with password hints all over your computer monitor?
Once you enable your Yahoo! account for OpenID access, you can simply tell any OpenID enabled website that you are a Yahoo! user. You will be sent to Yahoo! to verify your Yahoo! ID and password and then signed in to the website. Its that easy!
ADD YOUR COMMENT
Comments are moderated.
Randall Rode's online home for thoughts, notes, and experiments with a wide range of technology topics. Visit the about page for info on my recent projects and professional background. I welcome your comments!
Past listings from 2004 to the present
Need a home (or better home) for your website? I highly recommend HostRocket -- they are the best!
