[Opensim-dev] User Authentication

[Toni Alatalo]

Tommi Laukkanen kirjoitti:
> I got promising link from yesterday from Ryan (sempuki):
> http://dev.aol.com/OpenidTokenExchange 
> That seems to be developed to solve exactly this problem. First point 
> of authentication fetches tokens from token

yep and a token is also what the original / current rexserver uses for 
the 'global avatar system' uses to address this issue. there the client 
can connect to any world, tell who it is, pass a one-time(?) token 
gotten from auth a second ago, which the world then uses to verify from 
the auth the user uses (and the server has decided to trust).

the plan is probably to switch to openid and that in Rex as well, i.e. 
to 'standards instead of Finnish magic' (in J. Hurlman's words from the 
other day :) . we did the mistake back then 1,5 years ago when worked on 
rexauth that, when thought too much of avatars and other VW specific 
stuff also, even though did realize that one part is only about 
identity, failed to realize that openid would have helped (maybe the 
token exchange wasn't there yet even, iirc it's more recent than oauth?) 
.. also because the ppl who got the idea didn't know about openid i 
guess (i didn't know much either so failed to make the connection).

the other mistake i guess was that didn't consider how it could work 
with the existing user server in opensim, i guess because we thought 
that's somehow tied to the grid-bound auth used in SL and Opensim 
otherwise (which Rex got rid of and instead has the independent auth 
that can work for any grid or server, like openid).

at least the guys did get it implemented quickly and afaik it has been 
working ok since and kinda proves that model partly at least?

and now it seems we have a chance to get it with standards and properly. 
yay!

> Tommi

 ~Toni