By Mikkel Hald, 03/05/23
DeiC and WAYF on April 19-20 hosted a workshop in Copenhagen on using federated web logins for SSH-based access. Research institutions and collaborations typically have rather well-developed user managements for their web-based systems, and much is to be gained if this can be extended to also covering systems traditionally without, and unlikely to ever get, direct web-based access, e.g. high-performance computing facilities.
Workshop participants included people from German Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT), British Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), German DAASI International, and Danish Risø, DeiC, and WAYF. Elements of a number of self-developed solutions were presented and discussed. From the Danish side a solution based on SSH certificates was contributed.
It was conclued, i.a., that continued “friendly competition” between these solutions and a common entry to them on-line would be fruitful. The latter will make it easy for people with the need to find and utilise a number of carefully prepared open-source solutions, each with strengths and weaknesses of its own.
The group is planning a presentation at the 46th REFEDS meeting to be held in Tirana in early June.