Sign in form and register form

Question

Nowadays we see websites with login form/register form in the home page itself (to reduce number of clicks). do ya like it ( if yes why) / do ya feel its a good design specially if the application is integrated with third party components using single sign on

Answer 1

It honestly depends on the site. If it's the type of site where you really can't do anything if you aren't a member then it SHOULD have a full register portion on its homepage when you show up without an account. Social networking sites, movie rental sites, and money management sites come to mind as examples.

But take something like stack overflow. It's much more useful to show a page of the latest questions than a huge register form (I do love the "Not a member" banner though).

I don't think it really matters if the site uses its own authentication scheme or something like OpenID. I think my above rule still makes sense for usability purposes.

So my answer is: It depends :-)