UI Enhancement Requests for Network Identity Manager

[Jon Pilat]

Hello,

Stanford is looking at rolling out Network Identity Manager as the primary
interface for Windows users to get Kerberos Credentials.  As part of our
rollout preparations, we asked sample users to take a look at the NIM
interface and they came up with the following suggestions.


1. Collapse the "Get New Credentials" and "Network Identity Manager"
windows into a single window, with sections for "Get Credentials",
"Credential Options" and "Kerberos Tickets", with the last 2 being
collapsed by default.  The "Credential Options" section would have the
information in the "Credentials" pane and the options available behind the
"Kerberos 4" and "Kerberos 5" panes.  The "Kerberos Tickets" section would
have the list of tickets held and their expiration status.

2. Left click on system tray icon for NIM should not bring up the window
with the list of tickets owned by the user.  It would be more useful for
Stanford if it brought up the "Get New Credentials" window, with an
statement (if applicable) about whether you had a TGT for the requested
realm.  This could be combined with suggestion #1, above.

3. Status indicator in the system tray icon (light red vs. light green) is
hard to see.  A larger difference in the different system tray icons would
communicate status more clearly.  Status indicator also didn't seem to
always match the condition of "does the user have a tgt in his default
realm?"

4. Re-order the first fields in the "Get New Credentials" window to be
"username", then "password", then "realm".  Set the cursor in the first
empty field (usually password).

5. The "Options" button in the "Get New Credentials" window should be
replaced with a series of tabs for "Identity", "Kerberos 4", and "Kerberos
5".  The button layout currently is non-standard (for example, if you
click on "Options", then "Identity", nothing happens")

6. On the Network Identity Manger Screen, Rename "Kerberos 5 Tickets" to
"Kerberos v5 Tickets".  Many people who looked at that screen pointed out
that they had more (or less) than 5 tickets.

7. The terms "tickets" and "credentials" are used interchangeably.  To
avoid confusion, one term should be chosen and used consistently.

8. The "Failed to Renew Credentials" warning at the bottom right of the
main NIM screen failed to dissapear after a successful auth.  The warning
button is also pinched at top and bottom.

9. Resizing columns in the main NIM window seems to only resize the header
of the column.  The columns themselves do not resize until the user clicks
in the column space below the headers.

10.  When trying to access a kerberized service without a tgt present, the
NIM "Get New Credentials" window appears but is not reliably active in
front of other applications, so the user isn't aware that they need to
take any action.  Ideally it would place itself in the foreground and
possibly even indicate something via the system tray icon.

11. When any of the NIM windows are open there is no corresponding
indication in the Taskbar that a window is open.  If an item appeared in
the Taskbar that would also help with issue #10.


-- 
jonathan pilat - jonpilat at stanford.edu - polya hall, room 103
project manager --- it services client support/project office