Logging in

[dimexi]

I know this may seem petty and not that important, but does anyone else dislike (hate is too strong) the new logging in process? Why am i having to press buttons in 5 different steps just to get through to the page where in can select a game to play? It just feels clanky and unnecessary to me.

[GTSchemer]

I know this may seem petty and not that important, but does anyone else dislike (hate is too strong) the new logging in process? Why am i having to press buttons in 5 different steps just to get through to the page where in can select a game to play? It just feels clanky and unnecessary to me.

I absolutely agree, and I have seen the same sentiment. I am a big fan of GUI design that streamlines the most common use cases.

In the past you did this:
* Load page
* Type in username AND password AND click button.
* You are now on BGA.

Now you do this:
* Load page
* Type in username, click submit
* Type in password, click submit
* You now get a popup where you have to click an X to close, or "Let's play" which...also closes
* You are now on BGA.


Yes, it works and does the same thing. What baffles me is I truly do not understand why the change was made. It does not seem to improve advertising revenue, it took actual human work hours to make the change, it does not make things smoother for the average user (actually annoying them instead as you point out)...so there has to be a reason, right?

The only thing I can even guess at is maybe there is some security-related or server-related thing that is easier with separate steps? GMail did the same thing years ago, and it annoyed me then too. If I recall correctly, you could login on a single page, but now you have to do 2-3 clicks to complete the process.

[theAudsMustBeCrazy]

YES. It's totally dumb.

I know you need to type in your username and pword (although why does it never remember you, no matter how short of a time span it was since you were on the page?) ... but the window after the login which makes you click "Let's Play" is annoying and makes no sense.

The checkbox for "Remember Me" is pointless.

And the big banner that's always under the menu bar: "Do you want to always stay connected when using this web browser" is just another thing you have to click on to get rid of it. The auth never remember you, never keeps you connected. So why even have that dumb banner which takes up more than 1/8 of my screen?

[Meeplelowda]

although why does it never remember you, no matter how short of a time span it was since you were on the page?)

The checkbox for "Remember Me" is pointless.

I'm not having this issue. The only time I have to log in again is when I clear all cookies due to an issue I'm having with an unrelated site. Is your browser set to flush all cookies on a regular basis (or not store them at all)?

[Thomas]

Now you do this:
* Load page
* Type in username, click submit
* Type in password, click submit
* You now get a popup where you have to click an X to close, or "Let's play" which...also closes
* You are now on BGA.

The "Let's play" page is abundant, but the separate steps for user name and password is necessary, if not all users use a password to log in (e.g. using passkeys, mobile apps or login via google ....).

[GTSchemer]

Now you do this:
* Load page
* Type in username, click submit
* Type in password, click submit
* You now get a popup where you have to click an X to close, or "Let's play" which...also closes
* You are now on BGA.

The "Let's play" page is abundant, but the separate steps for user name and password is necessary, if not all users use a password to log in (e.g. using passkeys, mobile apps or login via google ....).

This could be communicated as a possible reason, but even if that is the root motivation, it's not necessary -- there could be a button to login another way, if such a way is supported, instead of making the interface less usable for all users in the name of improving one use case.

[Thomas]

I am not an BGA official, so I can just guess what could be the reason, why they changed to the new login process.

But they are not the only ones and not the first that switched from a single username/password form to a more flexible user authentication with separate steps. It is currently state of the art, and it has several advantages from security perspective. Microsoft, Google, Amazon, … all use this multi-step authentication and more and more medium and small sites do that, too.

The first step only asks for the user name and then continues with the user-specific authentication process. This could be a password, known to the site, but it could also be a third party authentication / identity provider, in which case the password is not know by the site you want to login to. The users should not by mistake use the wrong login form, because they would leak the password of the third party authentication service by typing it into the form for site-based login. Asking just for username in the first step makes sure that the user is directed to the appropriate authentication service without the risk of leaking their password (remember: it is the password of the authentication service, the user may use for many different site to login, so if it gets leaked, it could be used to identify as this user at many other sides).

Having a normal username/password form and a button to login another way, then there is a risk that some users don’t know which way they should use and would use the wrong way. When a user, who should use identity provider X, chooses to use the username/password form, they would leak their provider X password to the current site.

By the way: with the classic username/password form, you entered the user name, typed tab key, entered the password and pressed return key. With the new two-step form, you enter the user name, press return key (instead of tab), enter the password and press return key. This is the same number of keys to press as before.