What's your opinion on Windows identity foundation?

While learning about WCF security I've also read that as an alternative we could also use WIF deal with identities. I have a lot of stuff to learn, so I don't want to invest my time in something开发者_如何学运维 that will go away in a few months time.

Thus, in your opinion:

• is it here to stay or is it just a flash in the pan?

• Is it worth learning?

thank you

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Claims based identity has been around for quite some time, but the bar of entry was pretty high before WIF. You had to deal with lots of low level details. WIF makes all these so much easier. The "cost" of learning it is not very high and there's quite a bit of content to help you ramp up fast (the identity training kit, the patterns & practices claims guide, etc). You won;t need to invest a lot of time anyway.

In addition to that, claims based identity as implemented by WIF is standards based (WS-Trust/WS-Fed, SAML), so it is not just a Microsoft only thing. Many other platforms support the same and interop is simpler.

Finally, WIF is part of the .NET framework (even if it is a separate download for now). That means it will live quite some time :-).

So, to your questions. In my opinion, based on all the interactions I had with customers of all sizes and kinds, it is very much worth learning and using it, and it is here to stay. But, of course, this is my personal opinion.