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Distributed authentication

One of the more tedious moments in visiting a new website is filling out the registration form. Here at Trinity Bible College, you do not have to fill out a registration form if you are already a member of IMAP. This capability is called distributed authentication, and Drupal, the software which powers Trinity Bible College, fully supports it.

Distributed authentication enables a new user to input a username and password into the login box, and immediately be recognized, even if that user never registered at Trinity Bible College. This works because Drupal knows how to communicate with external registration databases. For example, lets say that new user 'Joe' is already a registered member of Delphi Forums. Drupal informs Joe on registration and login screens that he may login with his Delphi ID instead of registering with Trinity Bible College. Joe likes that idea, and logs in with a username of joe@remote.delphiforums.com and his usual Delphi password. Drupal then contacts the remote.delphiforums.com server behind the scenes (usually using XML-RPC, HTTP POST, or SOAP) and asks: "Is the password for user Joe correct?". If Delphi replies yes, then we create a new Trinity Bible College account for Joe and log him into it. Joe may keep on logging into Trinity Bible College in the same manner, and he will always be logged into the same account.

IMAP

<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Message_Access_Protocol" target="_blank">IMAP</a> stands for Internet Message Access Protocol. It is a method of accessing electronic mail or bulletin board messages that are kept on a (possibly shared) mail server. In other words, it permits a "client" email program to access remote message stores as if they were local. For example, email stored on an IMAP server can be manipulated from a desktop computer at home, a workstation at the office, and a notebook computer while traveling, without the need to transfer messages or files back and forth between these computers.

<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_Office_Protocol" target="_blank">POP3</a> stands for Post Office Protocol version 3 (POP3), an application-layer Internet standard protocol, to retrieve e-mail from a remote server over a TCP/IP connection.

<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_News_Transfer_Protocol" target="_blank">NNTP</a> is an Internet application protocol used primarily for reading and posting Usenet articles, as well as transferring news among news servers.

You can log into Trinity Bible College using your username and password of any allowed IMAP/POP3/NNTP server. Simply enter username@example.com as your username and the password of your IMAP/POP3/NNTP account.

Valid servers list: <ul><li>trinitybiblecollege.edu</li></ul>