Fw: solving the SFTP text mode issue

["Joseph Galbraith" <galb-list%vandyke.com@localhost>]

Whoops, forgot my reply all button.

- Joseph

----- Original Message -----
From: "Joseph Galbraith" <galb-list%vandyke.com@localhost>
To: <denis.bider%denisbider.com@localhost>
Sent: Friday, May 10, 2002 14:23
Subject: Re: solving the SFTP text mode issue


> > > Text file conversion is best handled by the routines that
> > > access the file on the system that the file is stored on.
> >
> > That is true, but I see no nice way to implement this in SFTP, because
it
> > clashes with SFTP's assumption that all files are binary. It is
> incompatible
> > with SFTP's random-access concept.
> >
> > A perfect solution to the text-file issue probably requires a mechanism
> > completely independent of SFTP's read/write operations. But an
independent
> > mechanism for text files seems like an overkill for implementations that
> > will only interact with mainstream platforms anyway.
> >
> > I would prefer to have standardized a simple solution that solves the
> > problem for the mainstream platforms, and let the exotic people
implement
> > their own complicated extensions that I don't need to support.
> >
> > Unless someone can come up with a really straightforward solution that
> > covers exotic formats as well. Perhaps this can be done, but it will
have
> to
> > be done by an ingenious someone who is well-acquainted with those
formats.
>
> Hmm... I guess we could add
>
> SSH_FXP_READ_RECORD
> uint32 start record number
> uint32 number of records to read
>
> and the response would be
> SSH_FXP_RECORD
> uint32 start record number
> string record[n]
>
> and
> SSH_FXP_WRITE_RECORD
> uint32 start record number
> uint32 number of records to write
> string record[n]
>
> and a flag to open a file in record mode.
> SSH_FXF_RECORD_ORIENTED.
>
> Openning a text file in record mode would
> resulting in recieveing each line as a
> seperate record with no termination.
>
> A server could refuse to open an existing
> file in record mode if it couldn't figure
> out how to.
>
> I'm not sure I'm really advocating this
> approach ... I haven't thought about it
> for more than ten minutes... but it does
> seem like it could solve the more
> general problem?
>
> - Joseph
>