I found bug 6220, the bug is the first paragraph only, the rest is me rambling on because I thought there were some default password for newly created koha users when no password was provided. 6224 explains the same bug better and without rambling. 3674 is an implementation of users with disabled login from biblibre. And 6218 has a tiny patch to auto generate logins upon user creation if none provided. These all leave me thinking: 1. what's the purpose of creating users? and 2. what would be desirable upon user creation? And those two questions is what I want to discuss here so answer may clear my view on this. There was some prior talking in the comments to bug 6220 with Katrin Fischer. The answer to my first question is pretty simple to me: we create users to use the system! But this leads to some defaults we were not enforcing: - they will require a login (implemented on my patch for 3674), we cannot allow users on database without a login - they will require a password. I think, but on biblibre it seems they need users with no password at all and also disabled users, which was implemented by making borrowers.password = '!'. It's not clear to me if they need both or just the = '!' one. This leads to the second question: - do we need empty passwords? or can we cope with disabled ones (='!') - if we allow disabled logins, then shouldn't we provide a way to disable/enable them (right now you can only get a disabled login upon user creation, and you cannot disable it again once you enabled it) - should it be desirable to have auto-generated passwords? If so, we need to decide if they would be viewable by superlibrarian upon creation (to tell it to the user), or if we silently will send it by mail directly to the user. If the second option is choosen, then we need to get sure KohaAdminEmailAddress is a valid email on installation and also require upon user creation to provide an email (and what if the user doesn't have one?) - KF also suggested these auto-generated passwords should be made 'one time only' and force user to provide a new one on first login, which means we would need to add a new column to database, something like borrowers.password_valid_until which should be a timestamp. I might be rambling again, so I'll summarize: - I think database should not have users which don't have a login defined. Then we should enforce it by default making systempreferences.BorrowerMandatoryField include OPAC login field, and also provide a mechanism to avoid empty logins just in case some superlibrarian modifies it. - I would like to hear from you to know how to close all these bugs/enhancements propositions. -- Fernando Canizo (a.k.a. conan) - http://conan.muriandre.com/ GCS d? s:+ a C++ P--- L++++ E--- W+++ w--- M-- PE-- !tv b+++ h---- y+++
In the US, some libraries require that parents give their children permission to access the system this means that if the child doesn't have permission they shouldn't have a log in - so having all patrons require a log in would be an issue in this situation. That said I'm thinking we need a system that emails the patron a link to activate their account and choose a password - that way we aren't setting an arbitrary default and the librarians aren't assigning passwords. This is very common on sites these days. Another option is to allow the patron to register online for a card and when they do that they choose their log in information - either of these options is secure, but the latter may be a problem in some libraries that require a form of identification to get a library card in the first place .... Also a ranting answer from me, don't know if I made anything clearer or just added more questions. Nicole On Tue, Apr 26, 2011 at 11:59 AM, Fernando Canizo <conan@lugmen.org.ar> wrote:
I found bug 6220, the bug is the first paragraph only, the rest is me rambling on because I thought there were some default password for newly created koha users when no password was provided.
6224 explains the same bug better and without rambling.
3674 is an implementation of users with disabled login from biblibre.
And 6218 has a tiny patch to auto generate logins upon user creation if none provided.
These all leave me thinking: 1. what's the purpose of creating users? and 2. what would be desirable upon user creation?
And those two questions is what I want to discuss here so answer may clear my view on this.
There was some prior talking in the comments to bug 6220 with Katrin Fischer.
The answer to my first question is pretty simple to me: we create users to use the system! But this leads to some defaults we were not enforcing:
- they will require a login (implemented on my patch for 3674), we cannot allow users on database without a login
- they will require a password. I think, but on biblibre it seems they need users with no password at all and also disabled users, which was implemented by making borrowers.password = '!'. It's not clear to me if they need both or just the = '!' one.
This leads to the second question:
- do we need empty passwords? or can we cope with disabled ones (='!')
- if we allow disabled logins, then shouldn't we provide a way to disable/enable them (right now you can only get a disabled login upon user creation, and you cannot disable it again once you enabled it)
- should it be desirable to have auto-generated passwords? If so, we need to decide if they would be viewable by superlibrarian upon creation (to tell it to the user), or if we silently will send it by mail directly to the user. If the second option is choosen, then we need to get sure KohaAdminEmailAddress is a valid email on installation and also require upon user creation to provide an email (and what if the user doesn't have one?)
- KF also suggested these auto-generated passwords should be made 'one time only' and force user to provide a new one on first login, which means we would need to add a new column to database, something like borrowers.password_valid_until which should be a timestamp.
I might be rambling again, so I'll summarize:
- I think database should not have users which don't have a login defined. Then we should enforce it by default making systempreferences.BorrowerMandatoryField include OPAC login field, and also provide a mechanism to avoid empty logins just in case some superlibrarian modifies it.
- I would like to hear from you to know how to close all these bugs/enhancements propositions.
-- Fernando Canizo (a.k.a. conan) - http://conan.muriandre.com/ GCS d? s:+ a C++ P--- L++++ E--- W+++ w--- M-- PE-- !tv b+++ h---- y+++ _______________________________________________ Koha-devel mailing list Koha-devel@lists.koha-community.org http://lists.koha-community.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/koha-devel website : http://www.koha-community.org/ git : http://git.koha-community.org/ bugs : http://bugs.koha-community.org/
* Nicole Engard (nengard@gmail.com) wrote:
In the US, some libraries require that parents give their children permission to access the system this means that if the child doesn't have permission they shouldn't have a log in - so having all patrons require a log in would be an issue in this situation.
I agree, millions of people around the world have no access to the internet. Making librarians have to make them a login is an unnessecary task. Also, although we would all like this to be untrue, but the vast majority of library users never look at, let alone log into the OPAC. I can imagine that making the login field unmandatory would be the first thing a lot of libraries would ask for. Having a login and password that is never used by the intended user,and probably therefore never changed, means we make an easier attack vector. For example if we know that pattern of the default login, all we have to do is get the password, reducing the complexity of the attack a lot. Chris -- Chris Cormack Catalyst IT Ltd. +64 4 803 2238 PO Box 11-053, Manners St, Wellington 6142, New Zealand
On 26/04/11 15:57, Chris Cormack wrote:
* Nicole Engard (nengard@gmail.com) wrote:
In the US, some libraries require that parents give their children permission to access the system this means that if the child doesn't have permission they shouldn't have a log in - so having all patrons require a log in would be an issue in this situation.
I agree, millions of people around the world have no access to the internet. Making librarians have to make them a login is an unnessecary task. Also, although we would all like this to be untrue, but the vast majority of library users never look at, let alone log into the OPAC. I can imagine that making the login field unmandatory would be the first thing a lot of libraries would ask for.
Having a login and password that is never used by the intended user,and probably therefore never changed, means we make an easier attack vector. For example if we know that pattern of the default login, all we have to do is get the password, reducing the complexity of the attack a lot.
I'm new to koha (and to libraries from the point of view of a librarian) and I haven't noticed what was the intended use for that. So far I'm fiddling with koha installations as superlibrarian and I thought everyone would be doing that or at least searching the catalog. Now I understand why was the way it was and all my rambling is disposable. -- Fernando Canizo (a.k.a. conan) - http://conan.muriandre.com/ GCS d? s:+ a C++ P--- L++++ E--- W+++ w--- M-- PE-- !tv b+++ h---- y+++
participants (3)
-
Chris Cormack -
Fernando Canizo -
Nicole Engard