docs(gateway): correct what OIDC does with an existing account (CHOO-2726) - #440
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…2726) The page said an OIDC login is refused when a local account already owns the address, and that auto-linking by email does not happen. Both were true when the page was written and neither is true now: a verified address links to the existing account and signs in as it, and only an unverified one is refused. The correction matters twice over. It is the account-takeover guard, so a reader who believes the old text will misjudge what turning off the verified-email requirement costs. And it is the answer to a question the page implicitly denies: how an administrator signs in through the identity provider at all.
wojtyniakAQ
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amaudruz and
christian-mcdermott
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September 11, 2026 19:24
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Summary
docs/old/GATEWAY_OIDC_SETUP.mdstates that an OIDC login is refused when a local account already owns the same email, and that auto-linking by email does not happen. That was true when the page was written. It is not true onmain:UserStore.get_or_create_oidc_userrefuses only when the token's email is unverified. A verified address is linked to the existing account, and the person signs in as that account — keeping its role, its rooms and its password login.Two reasons this is worth correcting rather than leaving to drift:
email_verifiedclaim, which meansGATEWAY_OIDC_REQUIRE_EMAIL_VERIFIED=falseremoves the only thing between a claimed address and the account that owns it. A reader working from the old text will misprice that setting.GATEWAY_ADMIN_EMAIL, so pointing that at an address the operator controls at the IdP makes SSO sign-in land in the admin account. Relevant to CHOO-2726.The page already warns the reader to check the code if it has drifted. It had.
Test plan
mainat 362bd6a: the unverified-only refusal and the linking branch incore/switch_core/db/stores/user_store.py, the seeded administrator's email and role incore/switch_core/main.py, and theemail_verifiedgate incore/switch_core/gateway/oidc_routes.py.