Higgins is an open-source project dedicated to giving individuals more control over their personal identity, profile and social network data.

Original author(s)Paul Trevithick
Developer(s)Eclipse Foundation
Stable release
2.0.0 / 15 June 2012; 12 years ago (2012-06-15)
TypePersonal data service
Websiteeclipse.org/higgins/

The project is organized into three main areas:

  1. Active Clients - An active client integrates with a browser and runs on a computer or mobile device.
    • Higgins 1. X: the active client supports the OASIS IMI protocol and performs the functions of an Information Card selector.
    • Higgins 2.0: the plan is to move beyond selector functionality to add support for managing passwords and Higgins relationship cards, as well other protocols such as OpenID. It also becomes a client for the Personal Data Store (see below) and thereby provides a kind of dashboard for personal information and a place to manage "permissioning"—deciding who gets access to what slice of the user's data.
  2. Personal Data Store (PDS) is a new work area under development for Higgins 2.0. A PDS stores local personal data, controls access to remotely hosted personal data, synchronizes personal data to other devices and computers, accessed directly or via a PDS client it allows the user to share selected aspects of their information with people and organizations that they trust.
  3. Identity Services - Code for (i) an IMI and SAML compatible Identity Provider, and (ii) enabling websites to be IMI and OpenID compatible.

History

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The initial code for the Higgins Project[1] was written by Paul Trevithick in the summer of 2003. In 2004 the effort became part of SocialPhysics.org, a collaboration between Paul and Mary Ruddy, of Azigo Archived 2002-07-27 at the Wayback Machine, (formerly Parity Communications, Inc.), and Meristic, and John Clippinger, at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society. Higgins, under its original name Eclipse Trust Framework, was accepted into the Eclipse Foundation in early 2005. Mary and Paul are the project co-leads. IBM and Novell's participation in the project was announced in early 2006.[2][3] Higgins has received technology contributions from IBM, Novell, Oracle, CA, Serena, Google, eperi GmbH as well as from several other firms and individuals. Version 1.0 was released in February 2008.[4]

As of 2019 Eclipse Higgins is archived, meaning that it is an inactive project.[5]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Eclipse Higgins Project - home page
  2. ^ Open Source Initiative to Give People More Control Over Their Personal Online Information - IBM press release
  3. ^ "IBM/Novell unveil rival to Microsoft Infocard". Archived from the original on 2006-03-15. Retrieved 2006-02-28.
  4. ^ Eclipse press release
  5. ^ "Eclipse Higgins". projects.eclipse.org. 31 January 2013. Retrieved 2019-07-05.