[cap-talk] A petname toolbar for Firefox

[Tyler Close]

On Feb 21, 2005, at 4:43 PM, Ka-Ping Yee wrote:
> While filling out a form on a site with no petname, i would like to see
> a message appear below the entry field that says something like "Treat
> this site as you would treat a stranger."  This message would appear as
> soon as the cursor is placed in the entry field and fade away by itself
> after the keyboard focus leaves the entry field.
>
> Similarly, while entering a password on a site that does not use SSL,
> i would like to see a message appear below the password field that says
> something like "This password will be visible to others as it travels
> over the Internet."
>
> In short, i agree with Jed that notification needs to be brought closer
> to the focus of attention (which, during typing, is the form field).
> I also agree with Tyler that this notification must not interrupt
> workflow by demanding extra work from the user.  Hence the concept of
> the transient warning message.

Given this warning message phrasing, I also agree with Ping and Jed. I 
remembered Ping's proposal as having a warning message more like: "You 
have not assigned a petname to this site. The site would like to be 
called paypal.com".

I think it is important that there also be a way to turn off these 
warnings, other than by assigning a petname to an untrusted site. 
Interacting with an untrusted site will be a common task, so the 
clutter would be annoying. There needs to be a way to cast off the 
training wheels, without undermining the protection model.

Tyler

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The web-calculus is the union of REST and capability-based security:
http://www.waterken.com/dev/Web/