Friendly HTTP 401 Status Code Message?

Question

I'm a developer not a wordsmith and as such I'm stuck.

We have a subscription based site whereby users may well come across our 401 page.

We've decided that the IIS 401;2 page needs replacing.

Does anyone have any examples or advise about writing a good non offensive 401 page?

Solution 1

This is an actual example - and a really funny one - supposedly taken from michaelbloomberg.com

Unauthorized (401)

Through a series of highly sophisticated and complex algorithms, this system has determined that you are not presently authorized to use this system function. It could be that you simply mistyped a password, or, it could be that you are some sort of interplanetary alien-being that has no hands and, thus, cannot type. If I were a gambler, I would bet that a cat (an orange tabby named Sierra or Harley) somehow jumped onto your keyboard and forgot some of the more important pointers from those typing lessons you paid for. Based on the actual error encountered, I would guess that the feline in question simply forgot to place one or both paws on the appropriate home keys before starting. Then again, I suppose it could have been a keyboard error caused by some form of cosmic radiation; this would fit nicely with my interplanetary alien-being theory. If you think this might be the cause, perhaps you could create some sort of underground bunker to help shield yourself from it. I don't know that it will work, but, you will probably feel better if you try something.

And don't get me started on all the cool 404 pages out there....

Solution 2

I had to refresh my memory to see what HTTP Error 401 - Unauthorized was exactly...

So bascially you can get this error if you are not authorized (no subscription) or failed to authenticate (wrong username/password). Plus some other corner cases.

Perhaps something like:
"We are sorry but we are not able to authenticate you. You have to subscribe to access these pages. If you are already subscribed, check you gave proper credential in the login step."

Just in proper English, of course (I am French), perhaps with more details (what to do if you forget your password, etc.). And a link to the public part of the site, and to the login page.

Solution 3

Only 9 years late, but maybe this could help someone out. The one I came up with for my website was,

Solution 4

It is a safe bet that Don Norman's and Jakob Nielsen's principles for Human Computer Interaction design is still valid for web design and 401 pages.

The 401 pages is still a web-page, the main difference is a slightly more confused/frustrated user.

Here is the design principles:

• Visibility - Can the user see that it is a 401 page and does he/she understand
• Feedback - Does the user understand what is happening
• Affordance - Does the user understand whats clickable and what to do with your interface
• Mapping - Does the user understand where to click to recover from the 401
• Constraint - limit the freedom the user have, to make it more cognitive easy for him/her to process.
• Consistency and standards - use the same standard that you used every where else in your website

A very good and free resource on this issue, is the Usability Guidelines Book from the US government.

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Comments

[Ed Blackburn]

Not that I'd put it to live, but by placing something similar to this on your dev / UAT environment forces others to assist...