OpenID implementation
Title
OpenID implementation
Short, concise description of the idea
Use OpenID as a login on LJ. Bind an OpenID account to an existing LJ account.
Full description of the idea
Actually, I thought this was how OpenID was supposed to work in the first place...?
People with an OpenID should be able to bind that to their LJ account so they can use OpenID to log in instead of the user & password. This login is both for posting to your own LJ and for commenting on other people's LJ under your own name. It should be completely indistinguishable from a normal username/password login.
An OpenID that is not previously bound to an LJ would give a user the anonymous 'roaming profile' just like it works now. Unlike the OpenID proposal at Allowing OpenID Users to Join/Post In Communities, which suggests a sort of auto-generation of fully privileged LJ accounts for OpenID users instead of them having to create an LJ account on their own, this suggestion should instead merely merge two existing systems: The OpenID login, and the LJ login.
As another difference from the above suggestion, I do not see a lot of code necessary to implement this, all you have to do is to allow two ways for a user to login to their LJ account:
Entering username/password
Or entering an OpenID URL.
The cookie setup and login screens are the same and they both already exist, since the OpenID system is working on LJ. The LJ user would specify in their personal user settings precisely what OpenID URL can be used to login to their account. This would bind that LJ login to that specific OpenID.
It is possible I have overlooked something critical here, but I cannot imagine why LJ admins have gone to the trouble of actually autogenerating LJ profiles with anonymous privileges instead of using the OpenID as a login as it was intended to be? That just seems like a lot more work. Is this a security issue?
Other websites such as www.zoomr.com can manage multiple login methods just fine.
An ordered list of benefits
- Easy login for OpenID and LJ users
- More seamless integration with other OpenID communities and actually taking advantage of the power of the login-once concept that OpenID introduces
- Integration ought to be simple enough, it is merely an alternative way to log in. The systems for doing it are already running on LJ
- OpenID would become a useful thing to have and it would most certainly be embraced by a lot more people if it could log them onto LJ each day without them having to remember username/password
- It would actually implement OpenID. Currently, OpenID users coming to LJ can only post anonymously, which means there is no point in having OpenID at all. You might as well just post anonymously in the first place
An ordered list of problems/issues involved
- None? This suggestion does not get around creating an LJ account at all, it only adds value to the OpenID concept.
An organized list, or a few short paragraphs detailing suggestions for implementation
- In every LJ user's 'personal information settings' under the 'privacy' or 'advanced' headlines, simply create another text box similar to e.g. the 'email' box where a user can type in an OpenID URL name, which from then on can be used to log into the LJ account in the same way that entering your username and password will log you in.