Big Blue appears to have a pretty clear concept of what it wants to do with Higgins, Burton Group analyst Mike Neuenschwander said. "They haven't told us everything that is going on, but I don't think this is a PR stunt. They have real engineers on it who have architected what they have been doing in identity management," he said.
Spot the difference
InfoCard and Higgins both promise to give people more control of their personal data when doing business online. The systems also should work with the multiple authentication systems on the Net, making it easier for people to manage Web logins and passwords.
But there are differences.
InfoCard is a Windows component that provides a user interface on PCs and services that allow the user to transact with service providers (such as online stores) and identity providers (such as credit card companies).
Higgins is broader in scope. It is a software framework designed to interconnect the various identity systems, and to help InfoCard and other existing identity management products interoperate. As such, it could lead to alternatives to InfoCard being created.
However, Neuenschwander did point out that there isn't much concrete information about the project or what it seeks to achieve. Furthermore, it is an open-source effort--IBM and Novell do not own or control the project, he noted.
"All IBM and Novell have really done is stated support for Higgins, and they want to take it in some direction that is beneficial to them. It leaves us to speculate," he said.
IBM and Novell conceded that there isn't much tangible about the effort. Indeed, the announcement was made to draw attention to the previously low-key open-source project, managed by the Eclipse Foundation and named after a long-tailed Tasmanian mouse. "It is early, and we want to kick-start it," Nadalin said.
Work will be done on timelines and specific usage examples, Olds said. "We're going to do some work on use case scenarios and are in the process of reworking the road map for what comes next," he said. "But traditionally, for open-source projects the road map is developed as the code evolves."
Background to InfoCard
Microsoft has described InfoCard as a technology that gives people a single place to manage authentication and payment information, in the same way a wallet holds multiple credit cards. An InfoCard client on a PC will connect with Web sites that need information for authentication or transactions.
Both InfoCard and Higgins take into account criticism of Microsoft's largely failed efforts with Passport, a single sign-on service unveiled in 1999. In the Passport system, people's information was managed by Microsoft instead of by the users themselves and the businesses they dealt with. This centralization of data is generally seen as the reason for the system's lack of popularity.
Microsoft is planning to update Passport and rename it Windows Live ID by next year. The service will make use of new InfoCard technology, a Microsoft representative said. Announced in November, "Windows Live" is the umbrella brand for a number of online services, including Windows Live Mail and Windows Live Messenger.
For now, Higgins is only real for software developers. IBM and Novell would like other vendors to participate, including identity management leaders such as Computer Associates, Sun Microsystems, Hewlett-Packard, Oracle and BMC Software.
"I think that a framework like this is the next logical step in the identity market and participation from a large number of vendors would be very valuable," Olds said. "However, I don't think it is required before this is a valuable step in and of itself."
While IBM and Novell see a clear future for Higgins, Burton Group's Neuenschwander is uncertain.
"To say where is this project going to be 12 months from now and what is it going to do--it is like predicting the weather a year from now," he said.
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