Re: porting PAM

[Chris Hedemark <chris@yonderway.com>]

On Wednesday, May 28, 2003, at 10:34 PM, Damien Miller wrote:

> Why does OpenBSD "need" PAM? OpenBSD already has a system which
> accomplishes what PAM offers. I suppose you just want Buzzword
> compliance with Linux and some of the other BSDs.

Well, maybe it doesn't need PAM.  But it needs (or, more accurately, 
people like me need for it) to authenticate users against LDAP.  The 
Solaris, Linux and OS X boxes are all doing it (Solaris being a big 
pain in the ass, BTW) but it's supported.

And no, don't bother posting the LDAP via Radius kluge again.  I've 
seen it.

> I'd love to see someone port the BSD auth API to other platforms - it 
> is
> better in every way.

Or, more importantly, make the BSD auth API a more useful alternative 
by implementing popular centralized authentication methods with it.

And, still, without the nsswitch it's only one component of centralized 
logins.  One of the biggest pieces, nsswitch, is missing all together.