On Tue, 2 May 2000 11:47:16 -0700 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> An interesting question. VMS Perl's crypt employs an algorithm that
> is compatible with the one used by AUTHORIZE and is internally consistent
> but not necessarily consistent with other crypt() implementations.
That makes sense. I assume that the intention was to provide an interface
similar to $HASH_PASSWORD from Perl? If I were writing code just to
interact with OpenVMS passwords I'd appreciate the decision :)
[example of VMS Perl crypt snipped]
> However, vms perl does not have an implementation of Solaris' crypt
> library nor its crypt() libc function and comparing the resultant
> perl crypt()ed strings across systems is not guarenteed to yield
> useful results.
It's disappointing that this isn't possible. Experience with various Unix
variants here (Ultrix, Digital Unix, Solaris, HP-UX, Linux) shows that the
encrypted password strings can be shared between them - otherwise we couldn't
use NIS of course. My intention was to use LDAP to emulate NIS (for the time
being anyway) which forces me to use crypt() passwords, I believe.
We've been managing our user data (registering students to use systems,
changing passwords and quotas, etc) using OpenVMS for some time. I wanted to
continue using OpenVMS with Perl to manage a copy of the user data in an
LDAP directory - at least until I can replace this rather ancient legacy
software with something better. This would involve managing crypt()
passwords.
What would be involved in providing a Unix-compatible crypt() function?
> For network verification things such as kerberos are a bit more robust.
> Kerberos services for VMS are available as part of the Multinet TCP/IP
> product e.g.
I'd love to use Kerberos, and may well do so in time, but it isn't a drop-in
replacement for what we have now.
Anyway, thanks a lot for your comments.
Regards,
Dave
--
David Morriss, Computing Services, | Tel: +44 (0)131 451 3262 (DDI)
Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, EH14 4AS, | FAX: +44 (0)131 451 3261
Scotland, UK | [EMAIL PROTECTED]
