Whenever you wish to make changes to MDN's content (such as editing, creating, or adding tags to pages), you need to be signed in. This article will explain the process of signing in and the authentication methods we support for identifying you as an MDN contributor.
Currently we support two authentication providers: Mozila Persona and GitHub. Persona is being shut down in November, 2016, so we strongly recommend using GitHub to authenticate, so that you don't lose access to your account after Persona is shut down. See Adding an authentication provider to learn how to update your account.
Signing in
MDN uses third-party authentication services to sign in to the site for contribution purposes. When not signed in, you'll see at the top of the screen the "Sign in" box, which shows icons for each of the authentication services we support.
Click one of those icons, or choose the service you wish to authenticate with from the list that drops down when you hover the mouse over the "Sign in" box. If you don't already have an account with one of the supported authentication services, you will need to create one.
From there on, the authentication provider will take over the sign in process. Follow their prompts or instructions to complete the sign in process.
Authentication services
While MDN is designed to support multiple authentication methods, we currently support only two: Mozilla Persona and GitHub. However, Persona has been deprecated and will be shut down at the end of November, 2016. For that reason, we strongly advise you to use GitHub for authentication.
If you already have an MDN account but use Persona to log in, be sure to update your account to include a GitHub login, or one day you will discover you can no longer log in to edit MDN. See Adding an authentication provider below.
Adding an authentication provider
To add an authentication provider to your account, visit the account connections panel. You may also find this by visiting your profile by clicking on your username at the top-right of the screen after signing in (there's an issue preventing users from seeing the gear menu, which should be fixed soon). Once on your profile page, open the "gear" menu, as seen here:
Click the "Account connections" option. This will open a page listing the account connections you already have. Near the bottom of the page is a section called "Connect a new account", which lists the types of accounts you can connect below it:
Click on the account type you wish to add (at this time, GitHub is strongly recommended) and follow the prompts to complete the process of linking that account to your MDN account.