Signing in with an emailed link

You do not need a password to use Grapevine. If you would rather not keep one, ask for a sign-in link and it arrives by email.

This is the same mechanism as a password reset, used for what people actually want it for: getting in. You are not forced to invent a new password on the way through.

Asking for a link

1. Go to /login/ on your site.
2. Choose Email me a link instead.
3. Enter your email address and send it.
4. Open the email and choose the link. You are signed in.

The message tells you which site it is for, which matters if your account exists on more than one.

What the page tells you, and what it does not

After you send the form, the page says the same thing whether or not an account exists at that address: if that address has an account, we have emailed a link to sign in.

That is deliberate. A page that said “no such account” would let anybody type addresses in and learn who has one, so the answer never varies. It does mean that if no email arrives, an address with no account looks exactly like an email that went to spam — check the spam folder first, then check the address.

Asking twice is safe

If you ask for a link again within a few minutes, you get another copy of the same link rather than a new one. Every email in your inbox works, so it does not matter which one you open — the second request does not quietly break the first message.

Links do expire, after about a day. An old link from last month will not sign you in; ask for a fresh one.

If you were in the middle of a course

A link requested from a course page brings you back to that course rather than to the front page, so you can carry on where you were instead of navigating back.

A sign-in link is as good as your password while it is valid, so treat the email the same way — do not forward it to anybody, including to somebody helping you.