Revision as of 22:27, 14 July 2019

Nikhef SSO Service Changes

The Nikhef single sign-on service (SSO) enables you to login to a wide range of services using a single credential, and to seamlessly connect to new application for many hours, almost the whole day, without having to login again.

What is changing?

In July 2019, the visual appearance of the login page will change. This is an intended change, and the ways to check if you really connect to Nikhef are the same: look for the domain name (should end in "nikhef.nl"), and desktop browsers should show a green address bar with "Nikhef (NL)" in it. The page will look like this on your desktop and laptop browser, or respectively on your hand-held or small-screen mobile device (the "Enable high-assurance" checkbox is experimental and for test-group users only):

What is in it for me?

This change is necessary for the following new features:

• capabilities for new services using the OpenID Connect protocol
• improved rendering of the SSO web pages on small, hand-held, devices

Other improvements and changes will happen over time. Some of these are already experimentally available, others may follow:

• ability to authenticate with certificate credentials from the GEANT TCS service
• compliance with the global interfederation assurance profiles ("REFEDS RAF")
• non-web authentication using OIDC (and subsequent authorization with JWT tokens), e.g. for single-sign-on access to dCache without certificates
• ability to authenticate with higher assurance level using two-factor authentication (experimental and for experts only)

Why did this change happen now?

The ability to provide OpenID Connect (OIDC) authentication capabilities is necessary for modern applications (like popular CI/CD tools), but also for non-web authentication from the command-line. Our SSO software, SimpleSAMLphp, only has OIDC support in the latest versions, and then only with modules that require the use of the 'new UI' user interface suite based on Symphony-Twig responsive web design frameworks. Adding OIDC capability we needed for connecting dCache and other portals therefore triggered a complete 'upgrade cascade': new version of SimpleSAMLphp, use of packagist frameworks, and through the OIDC module also the 'usenewui' Twig changes, and so forth.

Can I see it for myself?

Until the change goes 'live', you can preview it by using the account status viewer on the SSO test pages:

• SSO Account and Attribute Viewer (pre-production instance)