user identification with openID

Question

Since I have never used openID befor I have no idea about it.

I want to know when someone want to log into my website using openID do I have to register his information (is there any registration process efen if the user don't fill the information).

should I provide an alternative classical user registration beside openID.

Answer 1

The best OpenID login experience has no user registration. You accept their OpenID and you and your user are both done. Talk about lowering the barrier to joining your web site. It doesn't get much easier than that! If you must gather more information about a user besides just their OpenID claimed identifier, and this is a general rule with user registration: keep it minimal, and preferably don't ask for the additional information until the user actually requests a service that requires that you collect that particular data. This helps keep the user interested in your site and doesn't drive him/her away.

And if you're writing a new web site, I highly encourage you to not accept username/password anti-pattern. If you do your OpenID login right (today that probably means making big, prominent Google and Yahoo login buttons and then a smaller OpenID button that makes a text box appear) then users won't get confused. Before OpenID, lots of sites had "Login with Yahoo!" buttons on their sites and users "got it". OpenID can look just like that and be easy for the user.

By not offering a username/password style login, you somewhat force the user (with your ultra-easy OpenID login) to start getting used to not reusing an old or inventing a new password at your site. We as webmasters must train web users to stop giving their private passwords to so many web sites.

Answer 2

Our solution was to run our own openID provider and not tell anyone. If you choose to sign in without openID you get redirected to a very locked down openID provider. This was great as we started with 1 site and now have 4 and they can all share accounts. Our provider will not let you use it anywhere else (can't login here with it).