The popular self-hosted Kanban tool Planka has removed single sign-on (OIDC/SSO) from its free Community edition in version 2.2.0. The feature moves to the paid Pro version – a step that is drawing criticism in the self-hosting community.
Warning: risk of locking yourself out
Especially tricky: after the update, all accounts that log in via SSO are deactivated because they have no password login. If the only administrator account of an instance is SSO-based, you lock yourself out. Operators should therefore set up a password-based admin account before updating.
The “SSO tax”
Putting SSO behind a paywall is a common – and unpopular – way for self-hosted projects to make money: critics call it the “SSO tax”. Planka justifies the move by saying OIDC/SSO was always meant to be a Pro/enterprise feature and never fit the model in the Community edition.
Unlike projects that keep SSO paid from the start, many users see the later removal as a “rug-pull” – after all, they have already invested time and effort into setting it up. Anyone who needs SSO now has to switch to Planka Pro; alternatively, there are project-management tools that still offer SSO for free.
Sources: Self-Host Weekly, Planka on GitHub.
