On Wed, 28 Aug 2002, Noriyuki Soda wrote:

> >>>>> On Wed, 28 Aug 2002 00:42:00 +0900, itojun@iijlab.net said:
>
> > > 	* PAM modules
> > 	a bit off topic: was it decided to introduce PAM?
>
> It isn't decided, yet, as far as I know.

I don't think it's been decided yet. I suspect we'll need to support both.

> >	I don't like PAM,
> > 	and I prefer BSD auth.  (i remember soda-san didn't like BSD auth
> > 	for additional setuid binaries, but i think the benefit overweighs
> > 	the addition of setuid binaries)
>
> As you know, I don't like BSD auth.
> Because:
> - IMHO, it's less secure than PAM.
>   One of this reason is additional 10 set[ug]id binaries in BSD auth.
>   But I have other things to worry about BSD auth.
> - BSD auth cannot correctly handle authenticaion methods which need to
>   modify process status for authorization (like some kerberos
>   implementation).

This latter reason is why I think PAM is the one we should do first. You
can build BSD auth on top of PAM much easier than you can do the reverse.
There are some fundamental things, like AFS tokens, that BSD auth just
can't do.

Take care,

Bill