Signet Working Group conference call
January 20, 2005

*Attendees*

Lynn McRae, Stanford U. (chair)
Andy Cohen, Stanford U.
Brendan Bellina, USC
RL “Bob” Morgan, U. Washington
Steve Carmody, Brown U.
Tom Barton, U. Chicago
Tom Poage, U. C. Davis
Joy Veronneau, Cornell U.
Karel Sedlacek, Cornell U.
Andrea Beesing, Cornell U.
Steven Carmody, Brown U.
Ann West, EDUCAUSE/Internet2
Renee Frost, Internet2
Steve Olshansky, Internet2
Jessica Bibbee, Internet2 (scribe)

New *Action Items*

[AI] {Lynn} will request a copy of the guidelines for logo use from {Greg Wood}.

[AI] {Lynn} will move the documentation from the Stanford site to the Signet WG homepage.

[AI] Please contact {Ann} if you are interested in registering for the Signet/Grouper Early Adopters Deployment Workshop: <awest@educause.edu>.

Carry Over *Action Items*

[AI] {Bob} will send .htaccess local syntax to the group via the list.

[AI] {Tom} will send a few brief Signet case studies to the group via the list.

[AI] {Group} will develop use cases for Signet.

[AI] {Jennifer} will solicit on site feedback from UC Davis about the UI demo/mock up.

[AI] {Minh} will develop a list of requirements for how Signet will interface with LDAP and Grouper.

[AI] {Tom, Jennifer, and Gary Brown} will discuss the modularity of Signet's UI and the internationalization of code for Grouper and Signet. There will be a separate call for this item. [AI] {Lynn} will write up a person and function summary to express the relationship of privileges to roles and to determine what gets expressed in the eduPerson entitlement space.

*Discussion*

Final dates for the Signet/Grouper Early Adopters Deployment Workshop have been set for March 20-22. There will be a half-day installfest, with time for download, and configuration to your site. Another half-day minimum will be dedicated to product use cases, integration, and challenges. [AI] Please contact Ann if you are interested in registering for the Signet/Grouper Early Adopters Deployment Workshop <awest@educause.edu>.

Two tasks remain for v1.0 – the evaluation of assignments will have automatic activation or deactivation, and load testing. One item has already been completed -eliminate the external Tomcat user list by having Signet prompt for a username in the absence of an SSO; the next configuration will have a substitute login screen. Release date for Signet v1.0 has been set for February 7. 2006. Grouper has not defined a release date as of yet, but it will probably fall at the end of March.

The Group discussed logo usage; {Lynn} has been working with the designer for a new logo. [AI] {Lynn} will request a copy of the guidelines for logo use from {Greg Wood}.

The new simpler URL for the Signet website is available: http://signet.internet2.edu/, which is simply a redirect to the existing WG site. Efforts will be made to distinguish product and project pages. The Group also discussed content organization, how to best lead visitors through the site, and current restructuring ideas on the Shibboleth site. Recent email discussions have identified potential wiki space. [AI] {Lynn} will move the documentation from the Stanford site to the Signet WG homepage.

Another topic stemming from the mailing list is the definition and use of <Privileges> vs. <Permissions>. In brief, "privileges" define rights in an outward facing business language, and can be used to express policy. Assignments in the UI are to privileges, which are mapped to one or more operational "permissions" expressed on output in system-specific terms. The group agreed to the name change of the provision doc from <Privileges> to <Permissions>.

{Lynn} shared an email to the Group (cf. 19-Jan), which reflects the 2 packagings of Signet – a full toolkit (referred to as Signet) and a bundled version (referred to as Signet-QuickStart). Signet classes map to three jars: signet-1.0.jar, signet-ui-1.0.jar, or signet-util-1.0.jar. It will be expressed that there are no standing guarantees regarding contributed work. {Steven} shared that Shibboleth has seen a positive response from allowing people to easily add extensions to the build process, plug-ins, etc.

The next Signet WG call will be held on Friday, February 3, 2006 at 11am ET.