Specs for xml format for userdata with openid provider

One stated goal of the OpenID specs is: An end user can freely choose which OpenID Provider to use, and can preserve their Identifier if they switch OpenID Providers.

While the above has been supported using the delegate facility, but consider the situation below.

A user has registered with some OpenID provider. As time passes and attributes mature, and as the consumers increase and providers add facilities, the user data with the OpenID provider increases. Then switching from one provider to another will, in practical terms, require a mechanism to transfer all this data from one provider to another. This could be easily managed by downloading all the data from the first provider and then uploading it to the other provider. What is needed is an extensible format for this data while on the move . How the providers store the data is their concern.

While I can see that such a format need not be a part of the OpenID specs, but there needs to a place for this format in the overall suite of OpenID specifications. --mrinal 15:36, 1 September 2007 (PDT)