>��
When contributing it is associated to licence so I just find the actual model a bit weak.
I don't think that this is the case anymore. Pharo itself (and more and more pharo projects) are moving to git, so the Author string is not really used outside of the given image --- the author is based on git config (author) and github account (comiter).
In respect to code authorship, you can even sign your commits with git (I guess this could be an option in Iceberg at some future point in time).
>��Could we imagine a user id instead ?
I think the most common "user id" tends to be email, as it is the most unambiguous��id tied to a specific user (and easy to verify for ownership). But ensuring that someone else cannot use my "id" can be counter-productive in some scenarios -- e.g. when moving projects from sthub to github I had to "pretend" that I am someone else when creating the commits so the authorship is properly preserved for all contributors.
>��Another question is if an image may be used by several people ?
I don't know the precise semantics, but when you move image the Author (the class where this is stored) should be reset. So if you send your image to someone else they should be asked to provide the name.
>��having an external personal system that could be plugged upon each new image startup.
But iirc iceberg can now use credential managers? (not sure what is the state)
Cheers,
Peter