Add a login UI/page

[agjohnson]

We've noticed an uptick in users authenticating to the wrong platform recently. In each case this has been a matter of the user unaware that there are two platforms and that the platforms have their own unique user accounts.

Two auxiliary things happening here are:

• We changed the redirect behavior for unauthed users visiting readthedocs.com -- https://github.com/readthedocs/readthedocs-ops/issues/1602
• Users are getting to the login pages by search engines. This is not new but might be more pronounced because of the above.

The website already doesn't do a great job explaining the differences during login, but search engine traffic will bypass all of our attempts to explain the differences to the user. To help guide users best, I feel we should:

• Have a unified login UI/page that explains the differences better than the dropdown does now (just names and URLs)
• Redirect both platform login pages here when referred to from search engines and similar traffic sources
• Maybe delist the individual login pages to avoid these results entirely

The login page could probably mimic the signup UI/modal: it shows some differences between the platforms to guide the user to the correct login page. I'd probably start with a modal or complex dropdown, we should be able to trigger opening this directly using a URL about.readthedocs.com/#login and some custom JS. If this doesn't work, we can make a dedicated page. Buttons on the UI link to the individual /accounts/login.

In the future, a smarter UI with features like automatically detecting the last used platform would still be a benefit.

[humitos]

Currently, both login pages (.org and .com) look like:

I think we should make the difference there instead of any other page. People will arrive at that page from different places and we should communicate the about Community or Business there.

[agjohnson]

From the meeting, there are several paths:

• We add a login page or a login modal on the website that explains both platforms, similar to the signup modal on the website now.
• We add this modal into the application and show this from the application on referrers. The modal would redirect to the opposite platform if the user isn't on the right platform or dismiss the modal if the user is on the correct platform.

Either way though, we do probably want to improve the login dropdown experience on the website. This still might be the best place to start even if we end up preferring the application modal.

I wouldn't change the login UI for users that are arriving to the login page through our website though. This modal/redirection would still only be for users referred from search engines, or perhaps even any request that isn't direct or from our website.