Re: [9fans] some thoughts about auth*

[presotto@plan9.bell-labs.com]

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There used to be a key for connecting to other resources and
one for letting people log onto the console so that they could
use it (for cpu and file servers).  The latter was the authkey
and we eventually gave up on the function altogether.  The naming
is hokey, I'm to blame.

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From: "Roman V. Shaposhnick" <vugluskr@unicorn.math.spbu.ru>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: [9fans] some thoughts about auth*
Date: Thu, 7 Nov 2002 03:25:33 +0300
Message-ID: <20021107032533.A30255@unicorn.math.spbu.ru>

1. Isn't it strange that getauthkey.c:getauthkey actually
   returns .machkey ? Is there any historical reason for
   it to be getauthkey() especially when there is a
   field in Nvrsafe called .authkey ?

2. I'm not exactly sure that I understand why Nvrsafe has
   this .authkey member in it. The only place where it is
   being used by the regular Plan9, not a dedicated Plan9
   FS is in cmd/disk/kfs/auth.c which doesn't seem to make
   much sense, when nobody sets it up.

   As a matter of fact, I was able to spot it, only because
   in my particular case auth/wrkey *always* sets it to
   'roman' which is honorable, but very weird :)

All in all, I'd be grateful for any insights or explanations.

Thanks in advance,
Roman.