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The following services are planned for the Higgins API. Differences from the current version (0.2) are noted.

Open root context

The first thing any application does after instantiating Higgins:

Higgins h = new Higgins();

...is to open a context that will act as the root context. This is done as follows:

IContextRef cref = h.createContext(String contextExtensionId, String contextName) 

IContextLink cl = h.open(cref)

First we create a Higgins IContextRef to refer to the context that we wish to open. We pass this to the open() method from which Higgins returns an IContextLink--a kind of context proxy object--for the target context.

In version 0.4 a second argument will be added. It will be an object containing the claims required by the target context (the one referenced by cref). To know what claims these are, one will (in version 0.3) have to call a new Higgins method:

Policy auth = h.openGetOpenPolicy(cref);

Open/close (non-root) context

To open a target context, the application creates an IContextRef (cref) for the context (as described above) and invokes open passing the IContextLink from the "base" context:

IContextLink cl = h.open(cl, cref)

Planned changes: In version 0.3 the first argument will be changed to a Digital Subject. The same "auth" argument to be added in version 0.3 as described in the section above on opening a root context will also be added to this method. By version 0.4 or 0.5 the open method will follow the steps outlined here: Open.

To close a context whose IContextLink is cl:

h.close(cl)

Navigate

Higgins supports methods that allow the application to navigate and inspect the contents of a context through the IContext interface as allowed by the context's authorization policy.

Edit

Higgins supports methods that allow editing the contents of a context (as allowed by the context's authorization policy).

Misc

• Manages directed cross-context associations between digital identities (contained within contexts).
  
• Inheritance of identity attributes of digital identities along directed association paths.
  
• Context creation. Create a context from the union or intersection of two other contexts.
  
• Identity selector user interface. For interactive applications Higgins provides a single, consistent user interface for (a) user approval of a release of a digital identity (b) user selection from among a set of N>1 sets of alternative digital identities all of which make the required claims.
  
• Context plug-in management services (e.g. managing a registry of context provider plug-ins; resolving a context reference to a network location and a context provider implementation plug-in; etc.).