Higgins, InfoCard and conspiracy theories
I was unfortunately otherwise engaged yesterday and so wasn't able to comment on the IBM, Novell, Parity Communications Higgins
announcement. In my blogging absence, the guys over at Digital ID World did a great
analysis job (thanks Eric and Phil):
1. This is, net-net, a *win* for Kim Cameron's Identity Metasystem. In the past few weeks, Kim has had Verisign announce support, and now an open source project building out a WS-Trust framework for application developers. So, make no mistake about it, Higgins equals more momentum for the Metasystem.
2. However, the move by IBM and Novell *appears* to be a move designed to pressure Microsoft and ensure that their instantiation of the metasystem (InfoCards) remains "open."
3. That move is being done in response to one very big (and obvious) realization: InfoCards is going to ship in Vista (probably early) and it is going to be a game-changer in the user-centric identity space.
4. But more importantly, it may *also* be a game changer in the enterprise space, as well. There is a tremendous amount of enterprise interest in using InfoCards as a central metaphor for enterprise identity management.
5. So think about this for a second: InfoCards on a huge number of desktops, enterprises upgrading to Vista for its security features (like BitLocker), and InfoCards needs to have an identity credential issued. Where might that be issued from? Active Directory. It is no mistake that (as John Fontana observed), Active Directory is now the hub off of which all of Microsoft's enterprise identity management offerings hang.
6. ergo InfoCards will drive even more adoption of what is quickly becoming the Active Directory juggernaut.
7. Therefore, if I'm a company selling products that are competitive to Active Directory (say, like, for instance IBM or Novell), and I believe that the identity metasystem has gained enough critical mass, then it is absolutely in my best interest to push forward an open source project for the metasystem. Not doing so is to hand over my market to Active Directory.
8. Higgins is good for the community at large (the more Identity Metasystem things we get going the better), and necessary for the vendors involved.
Enough said!
They also point out, as does
Bob Sutor to his credit, that this is not as some in the press have commented - see Bob's (sigh) links - that this is not an anti-Microsoft conspiracy directed at InfoCard. To some extent I can understand the press reaction (apart from the obvious need to find an angle) given that the
InfoCard front-end identity selector, and not the
identity metasystem interoperability layer, dominated the stage during
Bill Gates' RSA Security Conference keynote. To my mind, it's a bit like highlighting the benefits of the credit card payment system by focussing on wallets rather than the Visa and Mastercard virtual credit card networks.
One thing that did strike me with the announcement that hasn't been discussed already is the notable absence of Sun. It is equally threatened by the proliferation of Active Directory and, just as I expect IBM and Novell will be building Higgins capability into their respective Workplace and Linux Desktop Windows client alternatives , Sun would benefit from an InfoCard alternative in its Java Desktop System (as well as the trio's identity management suites). As Bob also points out there isn't an anti-Liberty angle to this so I don't think that can be the reason - or
Sun's work with Microsoft to integrate WS-Federation and Liberty ID-FF for federated web single sign-on.
No! I think the big problem for Sun is
here: Higgins is a sub-project of the Eclipse Foundation's Technology/Incubator project. That would be a tough pill for Sun to swallow as it continues to push its NetBeans alternative. Yet another example (see James Governor's great post
here for another) why Sun should push dogma to one side and participate.
So, I share the view of other commentators who see this as a positive move and one which promises to bridge some of the important gaps around user-centric identity which I highlight in our recent
identity management report.
UpdateFor those of you looking for a succinct description of Higgins, take a look at
this presentation (PPT format) from EclipseCon which comes courtesy of
Johannes Ernst's
blog - thanks Johannes.
