InCommon Library Services

["Fleming, Declan" <>]

Hi – have any of you heard of this initiative?

 

It’s interesting that although Athens is mentioned, Shib is not.

 

Declan

 

-----Original Message-----

From: Cynthia Hodgson [mailto:]

Sent: Thursday, January 29, 2009 1:29 PM

To: undisclosed-recipients

Subject: [DIGLIB] Single-Sign-On (SSO) Authentication: a NISO Webinar

 

Single-Sign-On (SSO) Authentication: a NISO Webinar

 

When: Wednesday, February 11

 

Time: 1:30 – 2:30 p.m. EST

 

ABOUT THE WEBINAR

 

This year NISO has launched a Chair's Initiative--a project of the chair of NISO's Board of Directors, focusing on a specific issue that would benefit from study and the development of a research study, recommended practice, standard, or similar. Oliver Pesch (Chair, NISO Board of Directors, and Chief Strategist, EBSCO Information Services) has identified user authentication as the issue that he would like to see NISO address, specifically the question of perfecting single-sign-on

(SSO): achieving seamless item-level linking through single sign-on authentication technologies in a networked information environment.

 

To kick off the initiative, NISO will be holding a webinar on "SSO

Authentication: Understanding the Pieces of the Puzzle." Accessing information in a networked environment has been a reality for most user communities for over a decade. With the advent of hosted aggregated full text databases and the proliferation of e-journals and e-books, a user's search for information takes him or her to a number of different online hosts and platforms. When those information resources are commercial products, each platform requires the user to be authenticated, and as a result, that user may have a different identity on each platform. Like a puzzle, the problem of user authentication has many pieces—institutional affiliation; authentication method; various discovery and content provider platforms; the impact of crossing over and using different sources, search engines, computers, or locations... the list goes on and on. And even when we start to understand all those pieces, we are still left with the problem of putting them together—trying to make them fit in order to see the big picture and solve the puzzle. This event will aim to look at how the theory behind a pure technical implementation is broken and why so that we can then take that next step of asking, "How can we make this better?"

 

AGENDA

 

The webinar will feature speakers providing three different perspectives:

 

-- Library Perspective: How does SSO authentication fit into libraries and libraries' service to their patrons? Provided by /Adam Chandler, Coordinator, Service Design Group, Digital Library and Information Technologies, Cornell University Library/

 

-- Authentication Tools Perspective: How are authentication tools/software expanding into SSO authentication? What are Athens/OpenAthens experiences/views on trends both in the UK and internationally. What are broader trends in Access and Identity Management technology and standards and potential implications? Provided by /Keith Dixon, Access & Identity Management, Eduserv/

 

-- Content Provider Perspective: When authentication fails, the opportunity to reach the user -- and for the user to access the publisher or content provider's resource—is lost. Learn more about just how big a problem this and how seamless sign-on can help. Speaker TBA.

 

The webinar will provide attendees with ample opportunity for questions during the event and will post the questions asked during the event and their answers on the NISO website following the webinar.

 

 

REGISTRATION

 

For more information and to register visit:

http://www.niso.org/news/events/2009/authentication09/

 

The webinar is $79 for NISO and NASIG members and $99 for non-members in the U.S. and Canada. Check the website for student rates and international rates.

 

 

 

Cynthia Hodgson

NISO Technical Editor Consultant

National Information Standards Organization

Email: <>

Phone: 301-654-2512