I am a big advocate for making sure the on-boarding process for developers is as friction-less as possible. Developers should be able to signup, and login without anything getting in their way. This is why normally I wouldn't suggest adding anything unnecessary to to signup and login process, but I saw something over at Cloud Elements that I thought was interesting.
First, let me know that Cloud Elements gets bonus points because they emphasize signing in with your Github or Google account. I am a big fan of keeping all my API accounts linked to my Github profile--it just makes sense to me. I'd love it if API providers allowed me to store keys, SDKs, and other resources within my private Github repository, that I use across all the APIs I depend on. (I'm sure someone will tell me not to do this, but nobody has yet to convince me of why)
What really caught my eye logging in, was the updates they provided at the bottom of the login screen. There was an image, with a simple message telling me that v1 of the Cloud Elements API was sunsetting, with a simple "Read More" link, so I can get more details. I like this concept of adding these type of critical updates to the login screen for developers.
I am going to add a flexible messaging area to signup and login screen, as part of my suggested on-boarding building blocks. Developers may not be regularly logging into their API developer portals, so I wouldn't depend on this channel for everything, but in addition to the blog, Twitter, and other channels, it might make sense as a way to share important information with API consumers.
