This is a continuation of my previous post on OpenID.
Today I will explain, how you can personalize your OpenID URL when using the VeriSign Personal Identity provider (PIP) system.
Step 1: You should create a OpenID account with your Identity provider. In my case, my OpenID is https://georgeck.pip.verisignlabs.com. Now, that doesn't sound like a name I would want to remember or associate as my OpenID. Another reason why I wouldn't want to use the default ID created by my service provider is that, I don't want to be tied down to a specific vendor. What if my identity provider shuts down!
Step 2: Create a unique URL which you can control and setup a redirect to the Identity Provider. Again, taking my example - https://george.chiramattel.com is my site and I have full control over it. I edit the default page there and add the following meta info into the HTML header. (Remember the following example is for me and VeriSign PIP).
<html><head><link href="https://georgeck.pip.verisignlabs.com/server" rel="openid.server" /><link href="https://georgeck.pip.verisignlabs.com/" rel="openid.delegate" /><head/>
... followed by the rest of the HTML document.
This instructs the requesting site to redirect to my actual Identity provider. At a later point in time, if I wish to change my Identity provider, All I need to do is modify the above snippet and point it to my new provider.