Month: November 2007

New Version of CardSpace Available

On November 19, 2007

In Information Cards, Software, Windows CardSpace

.NET 3.5 Default Card Image I’m pleased to announce that the .NET Framework 3.5, which includes a new version of Windows CardSpace, is now available for download. The CardSpace team has been blogging about the new features and usability improvements at the team blog CardSpace: Behind the Code. I highly recommend reading it to understand the details of what the team has included in this release.

I did choose a picture for this post, however, that is emblematic to me of the many usability improvements, large and small, that have been made since the initial CardSpace release in the .NET Framework 3.0. The colored image is the new default self-issued card graphic. The previous default image was sepia-toned, making it difficult to visually distinguish between “full-color” and grayed-out versions of the image (which are shown when the card does not meet the requirements of a relying party). Based on customer feedback, we changed the default image so that it’s now easy to tell the two apart. This is but one example of the numerous improvements we’ve made to CardSpace based on feedback from actual use.

Like its predecessor, the new version runs on Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and Windows Vista. Download it and give it a whirl!

Sites Using Information Cards

By Mike Jones

On November 18, 2007

In Information Cards, Windows CardSpace

Percentage of Computers with an Identity Selector I’ve been inspired by Kim’s Information Card Thermometer to start tracking sites using Information Cards. If you know of sites using Information Cards that that I don’t have on my list, please send me a note or leave a comment on this post and I’ll add them. I’ll know that we’re reaching the tipping point when maintaining this list becomes completely impossible. Can’t wait…!

New Release of Firefox Information Card Add-on

By Mike Jones

On November 4, 2007

In Firefox, Information Cards, Software, Windows CardSpace

Firefox logo I wanted to call your attention to the new release of the Firefox Information Card add-on that Axel Nennker posted this week. Axel’s changes address a number of issues identified during the Interop at Catalyst in Barcelona. Among other things, with this add-on, Firefox now supports:

privacyUrl and privacyVersion, which enable privacy policies to be shown,
issuer and issuerPolicy, which enable the use of Relying Party STSs, and
sites that don’t use SSL certificates (which use http rather than https).

I believe that this brings Firefox up to feature parity with the Information Card support in IE7 when used with CardSpace, as well as enabling the use of Firefox with additional identity selectors such as the openinfocard selector and others. Thanks for the great work Axel!