Is OpenID The Way To Go?

It’s an interesting concept, but with recent developments, it may not be the way to go.

In case you didn’t already know, OpenID is a decentralized identity service. Basically it lets you login to any OpenID-capable site with the same credentials. Your login data isn’t tied to one huge corporation though (in theory). You register and OpenID with an “OpenID Provider”, basically a website that stores all your login credentials and processes requests from other sites. Anyone can become an OpenID Provider.

The major advantage of OpenID is you get one “username” (more of a URL) that you use on any OpenID-ready site.

One thing I’m not a huge fan of is the way you login to an OpenID-ready site. Registration couldn’t be simpler. Just hit register and provide your OpenID. You’ll be redirected to your OpenId Provider’s site, where you’ll have to give the new site permission to use your OpenID by entering a username and password. Can you guess how you login? You head over to your OpenID Provider’s website (like www.myopenid.com) and enter a username and password. Yournow logged in to OpenID. Now to login to an OpenID-capable site, just enter your OpenID URL (which looks like http://you.yourprovider.com). You’ll jump over to your Provider, where you’ll enter your password. Having entered the password, you’ll bounce back to the page you where on previously, now logged in. The major advantage of OpenID is you get one “username” (more of a URL) that you use on any OpenID-ready site. Personally I think the whole process is a little clumsy and needs work. It’s an interesting concept, though.

What are these “recent developments” that make OpenID less of a good idea?

• AOL has an OpenID tied to every account.
• Microsoft is doing the same as AOL.
• Microsoft is trying to “integrate OpenId into Vista” (uh oh).

Those huge corporations will likely try to take the Open out of OpenID. They will struggle to become the largest Provider, and etc etc. Microsoft is trying to “integrate OpenID into Vista”? That can’t be good.

Let me point something out. If someone gets your OpenID password, they instantly have access to every OpenID-ready site you use. “Oooh, a credit card number.”? You don’t want that to happen, do you? OpenID must not be used with sites that store credit card numbers. OpenID makes it easier for crackers to get access to your stuff. All they need to do is get login data from one site, and they have access to everything. If Microsoft is integrating OpenID into Vista (probably with a patch or Service Pack), then we can assume that Vista will be storing your OpenId URL and password so that it can log you in easier. Does that sound like a good idea to you? Given Microsoft’s reputation for security…

If someone gets your OpenID password, they instantly have access to every OpenID-ready site you use.

But having huge corporations “getting into the OpenID business” isn’t good. It all helps them in their quest to conquer the internet. So these companies will have control of the systems that let people log in to tons of sites on the web. They could block sites, for example. Say AOL doesn’t want you to use a site that competes with one of their services, they just stop their OpenID’s from contacting the sites servers and… Do you get the message? These companies will do anything to totally rules the web. Look at Yahoo. They’re buying sites up and integrating them into their main site (Del.icio.us, Flickr, etc). I’m guessing they’ll be an OpenID provider soon. Have you heard of “Yahoo Brand Universe”? Basically they’re trying to take on fan sites like The Leaky Cauldron, or other somewhat smaller sites (Leaky isn’t that small. They get over 100,000 unique users a day). Here’s an article about Brand Universe. Sounds like they want to take over the web, doesn’t it? They want to attempt to put fan sites out of business. It’s to late to do that to Harry Potter, though. Fan sites like Leaky Cauldron and Mugglenet have huge followings, then there are smaller fan sites fitting into Harry Potter niche markets (like The Site of Requirement).

If AOL, MSN, and possibly Yahoo are OpenID providers, what’s to stop them from buying up the smaller providers in their attempts to become the biggest provider? Nothing.

If AOL, MSN, and possibly Yahoo are OpenID providers, what’s to stop them from buying up the smaller providers in their attempts to become the biggest provider? Nothing. If AOL said they’d pay you $3 million for your OpenID-providing site, you’d have a lot of trouble resisting that much money, wouldn’t you. It will happen.

That’s why I’m not a huge OpenID fan. I like the concept, but it’s going to blow up in everyone’s face. That’s why I’m taking a different approach in NTugo, a new site I’m working on. I’m thinking of having OpenId’s working in tandem with NTugo Accounts, so you’ll be able to login with a username and password or an OpenID. An NTugo Account will optionally have an OpenID tied to it so you can login either way. Suppose one of those corporate OpenID’ers decides to block OpenID logins to NTugo (supposing NTugo got big enough for it to matter). A user could just login with a username and password instead. If they still want to use OpenID with NTugo, they could proceed to their profile page and bind an OpenId from a different provider to the NTugo account. Good idea, or what?

Hmmm. Maybe go and see what you have to do to become an OpenId provider….

 (Continued from The Road to Linux)

Yes! I’ve finally got a working Linux installation. After spending the morning yesterday downloading three of the discs of openSuSe 10.2 and installing it later that afternoon, I finally have Linux installed. How many hours have I spent preparing all this? I’d say nearly 18 hours.

I’ve got linux…now what? I plan to download the remaining discs of the openSuSe distro soon (along with some other packages off sourceforge). I’d like to eventually get a cheap 802.11g card and install that too. It would be nice to have internet access. You can’t do much on a computer these days if you don’t have internet capability, can you? Then I’d like to see how little I can use Windows for the duration of a week. I already know of some things I’ll need to do on a Windows machine, but it would be fun to see how little I could use Windows.

I was surprised by the packages offered by the openSuSe distro. Several open-source packages I already use on Windows are there (like Audacity). Unfortunately, a lot of these are on the discs I haven’t downloaded yet. Installation of the base openSuSe CDs took ages. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, given the power of the computer I was using.

Here are the specs of the machine I installed Linux on:

• 488MHz Celeron
• 256MB RAM
• 100GB HD (Linux) and 20GB HD (Windoze 98 Ack!)
• Integrated graphics and sound (SiS620)
• 15″ monitor with 800×600 resolution (and horrible black space around picture)
• CD-RW drive

Now, the specs of the computer I normally use:

• 2.88GHz Pentium D
• 1.25GB RAM
• 250GB HD (Windows XP) and an external backup drive
• Radeon X1300 graphics
• integrated sound
• 17″ monitor at 1024×768 (though it can go higher)
• DVD+/-RW drive

As you can see, if I do try to use mainly Linux for a week, it will be a challenge. Not just because of the lack of Windows, but because of the machine’s lack of power. If I do try a “Week Without Windows”, I’ll let everyone know and blog about it as I avoid Windows. Until then, it’s just a cool idea.

I decided recently to install Linux on an old machine I have (well, actually I decided a couple years ago and haven’t gotten around to it until now). It’s an ancient 488Mhz Celeron with 256MB of RAM and (currently) about 120GB worth of Hard Drive space (spread over two drives). The hard drives in the computer are 20GB and 100GB. The 20GB one has been in there with Windows 98 installed. I recently installed the 100GB one for Linux (dual-boot, yeah!).

Installing the hard drive proved to be an unnecessary challenge. First I had to open up an older computer that no longer functions (failed motherboard) and remove the 100GB hard drive so I could put it in the PC that would eventually run Linux. After opening the case, I located the hard drive. There it was in a metal enclosure…in the most idiotic place ever. It was attatched vertically on the front of the case, just below the wires connected to the system’s power button. There was no visible way to remove it. Above the drive were the optical drives, preventing it from sliding upward. After an hour of searching through Compaq’s website and talking with a support guy, I found a page with details on replacing hard drives. Looking at the pictures of different types of mounting methods, I saw one that was vertical. Aha! Going back to the case, I searched around for a little hard to see screw that was just out of reach of my screwdriver. I spent 15 minutes looking for a longer one. Once I found a suitable screwdriver (magnetic, to prevent the screw from falling who knows where inside the computer), I took the screw out. After that, all I had to do was pull the enclosure out with a “swinging motion”, so the hard drive would pivot on this hidden bracket. I quickly took the hard drive out of the enclosure and closed up the computer (it had some more functional cards that might be useful in the future).

It was time to install the “new” hard drive. I opened up the computer that would run Linux in the future. Dodging wires, I slid the drive into it’s slot, connected the wires, and set the jumper for SSCE, like the one already in there. I plugged the machine back in and started it up. What? “Primary Master Error”? I must not have set the jumpers correctly. I opened the case up again (after disconnecting the machine, of course). I set the old drive to be the primary drive and the “new” one to be secondary. I closed the case, plugged everything in and…somewhat success. No error, but I had to go into the BIOS. After 15 minutes of work, the BIOS recognized the new drive, and Windows booted off the other one. Time to install Linux easily and live happily ever after, right?

Wrong. I put my recently burned Ubuntu 6.10 disc in and rebooted. I was soon greeted with the Ubuntu logo and a set of choices. I hitthe option to start the Ubuntu Live Desktop, where the icon to start the installation was. Okay, the resolution was too high for my old monitor (which can only go up to 640×480 for some reason. It needs to be replaced). I wnet back to the menu. I set it to use 640×480. I got the Ubuntu loading screen and waited ages. Then it X11 started and everything turned brown with vertical lines. The flickering was so crazy I couldn’t see anything, even though the desktop had loaded. I’m guessing Ubuntu isn’t compatible with my ancient motherboard’s onboard graphics. So no I’m downloading OpenSuSe. If that doesn’t work, then I’ll try Fedora Core 1. The local library has a book with a couple CDs with Fedore Core 1, so I’ll try those if SuSe doesn’t work.

You can have a lot of fun with Photoshop. You can make Darth Gates, give Jack Sparrow an iPod, etc. The possibilites are endless. It’s best to work at your idea until it looks realistic. Your image won’t be as funny if it’s easy to see that you pasted someone’s head over Emperor Palpatine.

There are a couple useful techniques you should know about as well. Take a look at the Bill Gates photo to the right. See the lightsaber he’s holding? I took a picture of Bill Gates and a photo of a lightsaber. Then I moved a copy of his hand onto a new layer, making sure it was in the same spot as the original. Then I pasted in the lightsaber, resized and rotated it, and moved it under the hand layer. It looks like he’s holding it. You can do this with any object (iPods, cell phones, coffee mugs, etc). For the lightsaber blade, I drew aline with - guess what - the Line tool. I made the line a very light red color (almost white). To add the blade glow, all I had to do was use the Outer Glow function in the Layer Styles window. Voila, instant Darth Gates. Make your own Apple-themed Photoshop pictures. Post ‘em in the comments if you want.

As a Firefox user (get Firefox if you haven’t already!!!), I have collected a ton of Add-ons for my browser. They range in usefulness from “barely used” all the way to “totally useful and essential”. Here are my favorites (in no particular order):

1. Colorzilla - Allows you to retrieve a hexadecimal color code for any color on any website using an “eyedropper” tool.
2. Google Notebook - Allows you to save scraps of text and URLs to Google’s servers for later retrieval.
3. IE View - I don’t really care for IE Tab.I prefer IE View. What this useful plugin does is it adds an option to your context menu that opens the current page (or targetted link) in Internet Explorer (luckily I’m finding this less useful ).
4. MeasureIt - Webmasters will find this one useful. Activate this and you can measure the pixel dimensions of anything on any page. Unbelievably useful.
5. Remove It Permanently - Make anything you don’t like vanish from any online page. It won’t be back (unless you want it again).
6. Scrapbook - Save a copy of any webpage to your computer with this useful extension.
7. SEOpen - Check PageRank, backlinks, alexa rank, anything about any website.
8. Stylish - Don’t like Google’s white background? Tired of all that orange on CNet? Try Stylish, a Firefox add-on that allows you to apply custom CSS stylesheets to any page on the web.
9. Web Developer - A webmaster’s ultimate browser toolbar. You can do an insanely huge amount of things that will be useful during the development of a web site. A couple examples are resizing the window to a precise size, disabling CSS or JavaScript, validating your code, etc. One of the best Firefox Add-ons ever.
10. Dummy Lipsum - I don’t use this one too often. When building a web layout it’s often useful to generate some meaningless “dummy text” (often resembling “Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet…”) to fill out content areas. This add-on generates dummy paragraphs and lists for you.

That’s all, folks. Happy browsing!

Thinking of starting a blog? If so, you’re probably trying to decide what system to use to run it. I’d say the top two are Blogger (blogger.com) and Wordpress (wordpress.org. Blogger is mainly a pre-hosted service that stores all your stuff on Google’s servers. Not a bad arrangement, unless you want more control over everything (you know who you are). Wordpress is a set of PHP scripts you upload to your web host and follow some instructions to install it (it’s pretty easy and only takes 10 minutes or so). “Wordpress.com” is a service that gives you a limited Wordpress blog that’s hosted by someone else (sort of like the Wordpress version of Blogger). I don’t recommend this, unless you are unable to install Wordpress (if your host has Fantastico it can do it for you in 30 seconds by the way). If that’s the case, you may prefer Blogger anyway. I like the look and feel of Wordpress and it’s added power. I may move this blog over to a Wordpress setup eventually (keeping the same address, or course — you’ll barely notice a difference). One cool feature of Wordpress is a “Blog Importer”. If your blog used to be on Blogger or another service, Wordpress can import all your old posts and stuff. Cool or what? Well, enough ranting, it’s time for the Head to Head.

Blogger
Okay, first up is Blogger, Google’s offering.

Blogger has a nice feature set, but doesn’t clutter things or make itself hard to use. It’s a great introductory blogging system, letting you host your blog on Google’s servers or partially on your own. You can use either a subdomain resembling you.blogspot.com or point your own domain at the blog. The template system used since it’s launch in 1999 is amazing. You can install a new design just by pasting some text into a box, or by using one of the included ones in the template gallery. Making your own doesn’t take much beyond basic HTML and CSS knowledge either. You can still use that great template system or the new “layouts feature” that allows you to modify one of the several included designs just by dragging and dropping. Unfortunately this makes it harder to code your own new design. You can use either of the methods, since Blogger understands both. Comments, feeds, posting by email, multiple authors, and lots of other useful features are supported as well. Blogger’s pretty good, especially for the novice user (even if you have plenty of web experience, you may like Blogger).

Wordpress
Now it’s time for Wordpress, the option for those who want absolute control of everything.

If Blogger has a “nice” feature set, Wordpress’s is spectacular. You can separate your posts into categories, write static pages (an about page is a good example), you can easily manage a blogroll, etc. You can configure virtually anything if you want to. The templates used for Wordpress are available all over the web (just Google “wordpress theme”). They’re not quite as easy to make as Blogger ones, though you have a lot more you can do. It’s best to create a web layout first, then start template-itizing it with Wordpress’s “template tags”. Wordpress requires having a place to host it (with PHP and MySQL support). You can get such hosting for as little as $2.99/month. That price includes your own domain too. I like Wordpress a lot, it’s not quite as easy to use as Blogger, but it’s easy nonetheless. I highly recommend Wordpress, but NOT the service known as wordpress.com (it’s practically useless unless you want to pay them for “premium services”).

Conclusion
I highly recommend either Blogger or Wordpress for anyone wanting to start a blog. Blogger is great for people who are just getting started with Blogging and don’t know much about the inner workings of the web, while Wordpress is great for more experienced people. If you can set up a Wordpress blog (or if you know someone who can set it up for you), you’ll definitely not outgrow it when your blog becomes popular.

There are forums, blogs, webmail scripts, an more. What’s wrong with that? They ALL use their own database table to store login information. So if a webmaster runs a website that has a forum and other 3rd party scripts that require users to login, you’ll have to make your users sign-up and login for who knows how many scripts. It’s getting to be ridiculous. As a user, do you want to have to register to post comments, register to use a forum, etc all for ONE website? I didn’t think so, especially in an age where most sign-ups require email activation - which means heading over to your email client again. No, it’s not good. What can be done about it though? I believe that a standard login protocol needs to be developed. A database structure that stores login information that any script on the same server can access. That way your forum, blog, and CMS all work with the same login data. It would be extremely hard to set something like that up on your own. You’d be better off writing your own forum and CMS code rather than using 3rd party scripts. It doesn’t even require much development. All that needs to be done is the following:

1. Someone needs to find a MySQL database structure that will fit most applications.
2. This standard needs to gain a following of developers so as to make the standard, well, standard.
3. Major scripts would need to be rewritten to use the standard.

Simple in theory, but not in practice.

I think a good system would be to have a database with the table userAuth in it. This table would have the columns userID, userName, userPass, userEmail, userActivated, userBanned, and userJoinedDate. If a script needed more information stored it would have another table created and match up the data with the userID (which is not null and auto_increment‘ed). This system should work for most applications.

Windows’ screen-capture features not good enough? Try FastStone Capture. It’s free, and works pretty good. It sits by the taskbar clock unnoticed until you need it (assuming you disable the annoying “capture toolbox that hovers around your screen). FastStone capture takes screenshots of the entire screen, the active window, a rectangular region, a freehand region, or my favorite: a scrolling window. All these can be invoked through the taskbar icon or with keyboard shortcuts. Depending on how you configure it, FastStone Capture will either auto-save the file, prompt you for a location, send it to the clipboard, or take it to a built-in editor for some basic editing (crop,resize,etc). Not bad for a free screencap program, right?

What’s with Adobe lately? First they introduce Adobe Remix, an online video editing app, and now they’re doing the same thing with Photoshop. Both programs will be free and ad-supported. I suppose they ay be useful for some things like if you’re blogging from a public computer and need to edit an image quickly, but they won’t be useful for much else. They’re obviously aimed at the totall novice, probably at people who are even too inexperianced to bother with Photoshop Elements. I’m guessing they’re mainly launching these new services to put down some of these new startups that are offering online photo/video editing apps. To top that all off, Photoshop takes long enough to load, and runs slow emough, already. Imagine going over the web. So, you definitely don’t want to ditch your copy of Photoshop!

You may have played Breakout, an old Atari game, but have you tried DXBall? DXBall plays in a similar manner to breakout, but they’ve went well beyond it. You move the paddle at the bottom of the screen to bounce the falling ball back to the top of the screen, trying to hit the bricks. Some bricks explode, destroying the bricks surrounding them, others take more than one hit to be destroyed, etc. Sometimes when you destroy a brick a powerup falls from the top of the screen. The powerups give you fire-able lasers, bigger paddles, and tons of other useful things to use in game. Be warned, this game is very addicting. You will likely play for hours on end. Try it out. It’s free with a few boards, but you can pay a small amount of money to get more.