Central Sign On

Central Sign on is a web service for storing user account information, such as:

Username, passwords, and other authentication information
Address books
Calendars and Events
Social Networks
Blog posts and comments
User generated content.
Other information.

The goal of Central Sign On is to store all of the information for a user in a single location, rather than having it distrbuted across many web applications. This system has many benefits for users and website operators.

For Users

Central storage for all user account information.
Only one place to make changes. Change your email address and other personal information in one spot for all websites.
Control access. Control who has access to your information. Be completely private, or expose data for mashups.
Publish your information. Information can be publised in a variety of formats, including RDF, FOAF, iCal, vCal and others.

For Web Applications

Reduces storage costs. Web applications can distribute storage requirements to the user's account rather than requiring storage dedicated to a web application.
Reduced development. Central Sign On provides the commodity features that web applications must have, but which don't add value, leaving developers to focus on differentiating feature.

Other intresting aspects of Central Sign On include:

Integration with OpenID.
Publish information in a variety of formats.
Expose data to mashups.

The CSO project is in the planning, analysis and design stage. We are currently planning the feature set, designing the APIs, and writing the core libraries. If you'd like to get involved, please contact the project lead and join the mailing lists.