News and information about InCommon Academy offerings

[Dean Woodbeck <>]

InCommon has launched a new centralized Federated Error Handling Service 
available to all Service Providers (SPs) in the federation 
(https://spaces.internet2.edu/x/kJOVAQ). The goal is to provide a better 
experience for users in the event that they are unable to access a federated 
service, which will help prevent them from becoming confused or frustrated.

In many situations, the identity provider (IdP) does not provide the SP with 
sufficient information (attributes) to make an access control decision. Just 
telling a user that “the necessary attributes are not being released” usually 
does not help. We need to give users information and tools that will help 
them solve their problems.

Using this new service, SPs can automatically generate simple but effective 
error pages for the end user. These dynamic error pages rely on the Error 
Handling URL in IdP metadata, which provides a pointer to a comprehensive IdP 
support page for users that experience difficulties during federated login.

In order for this service to work effectively, IdP operators need to add the 
Error Handling URL in their metadata.

SP operators use the Federated Error Handling Service to automatically build 
and display a custom error page. The service takes advantage of MDUI elements 
in metadata (https://spaces.internet2.edu/x/2YGKAQ) to customize an 
SP-branded page displaying the SP’s logo and text specific to the SP and IdP 
in question. Visit the wiki for examples and instructions how to incorporate 
the Error Handling Service into your SP deployment   
(https://spaces.internet2.edu/x/kJOVAQ).

We continue to look for ways to improve and expand on the tools available for 
use by site administrators. Please let us know if you have suggestions or 
questions (admin at incommon dot org).