[MOBY-l] versioning services...authentication...

[Martin Senger]

> Anyway, authentication isn't something we need to worry deeply about.  
> It is all handled by libraries below our Moby libs.  It's nothing more
> than a trivial line or two of code to implement the solution for your
> own situation.
>
   I am not sure about it. I would prefer to see some code documenting
it. I know that I myself said that authentication is the task of the
underlying protocol - that's what Richard expressed here and what Mark
confirmed.
   But I think (but I may be wrong) that we all three were talking from
the perspective of the service provider. Simply speaking: service provider
does not need to change his/her code when [s]he wants to have the service
only for registered users, [s]he just adds an HTTP special file with an
HTTP authentication configuration to her/his CGI-bin directory.
   But from the client perspective it may be different. And I do not think
that the Moby clients can handle authentication. Surely not my Java
client. We probably need to extend our clients libraries in order to be
able to accept user name and password (in a way that is dependent on their
user interface) and use it in the HTTP/SOAP request (in another way to do
what any Netscape does for us hiddenly for years).

   Just my 2c, and with regards,
   Martin

PS. Mark, this email was also about versioning. Do you have an answer, or
a policy for that? M.

-- 
Martin Senger

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