PAM modules

[Kostik Belousov]

On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 02:43:47AM +0400, Lev Serebryakov wrote:
> Hello, Xin.
> You wrote 21 сентября 2011 г., 2:34:09:
> 
> > That's true but is there any very compelling reason to do that (not
> > say no if someone really want to invest time on this and maintain it)
> > instead of just using an actively maintained codebase?  The OpenLDAP
> > license is pretty similar to a BSD license:
>   My point is not a license. I don't know, what is simpler:
> (a) strip-down and rename API for OpenLDAP and later import new releases,
> with new strip-downs and renames (IMHO, it is harder, than import and
> support almost-intact code, like sendmail or bind),
>   or
> (b) maintain local code, most of which is auto-generated from standard
> by very mature and stable tool, as Lev's asn1c is. I know Lev
> personally, and he says, that this tool is used by many Telco
> operators and other Big Companies and he is not aware about any
> outstanding bugs (from year 2007!) even when very complex (much more
> complex than LDAPv3) ASN.1 rules are processed. Sometimes he is
> contacted for support, but always it is not bugs in compiler, but some
> other problems.
> 
>   Maybe, import and maintaining of hacked OpenLDAP is simpler in
> long-standing perspective. Maybe not. I only want to point, that if we
> want our own LDAP client library, we don't need to write tons of
> non-obvious, error-prone and security-sensitive code by hands.
> 

Yes, the question of maintanence of the OpenLDAP code in the base
is not trivial by any means. I remember that openldap once broke
the ABI on its stable-like branch.

Having API renamed during the import for the actively-developed third-party
component is probably a stopper. I am aware of the rename done for ssh
import in ssh_namespace.h, but I do not think such approach scale.

Would the import of openldap and nss + pam ldap modules in src/ give any
benefits over having openldap and ldap nss + pam modules on the dvd1 ?
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