Re: [Tracker] [tracker-list] network support

[Philip Van Hoof <spam pvanhoof be>]

Attached is a response-reply from a reply that Dmitry sent me on my
private E-mail address. I think it's interesting for the list, so I'm
forwarding it.

On Tue, 2010-05-11 at 21:05 +0200, Philip Van Hoof wrote:
> On Tue, 2010-05-11 at 22:26 +0400, Dmitry Bashkatov wrote:
> > Hello!
> > I'm going to try to add network support for tracker. Realization will
> > not affect main code base. There will be daemon that sits on server
> > and talks to tracker-store using dbus, opening network RPC interface.
> > What do you think about this idea?
>
> Why don't you just make an apache module that converts the results that
> you get from DBus to RDFXML? http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-rdf-syntax/
>
> You might have to do a bit of setuid()-ing to get the right session bus
> from DBus. Maybe this: http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.1/suexec.html ?
>
> http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.1/mod/mod_suexec.html#suexecusergroup
>
> If you do it as an apache module then you'll get all the security
> features of Apache for free. Like https, and authentication.
>
> http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/howto/auth.html
>
> Surely you don't want your custom server to implement all that stuff if
> Apache has done it all already?
>
> Cheers
>
> Philip

-- 


Philip Van Hoof
freelance software developer
Codeminded BVBA - http://codeminded.be

--- Begin Message ---

• From: Dmitry Bashkatov <me nailgun name>
• To: Philip Van Hoof <philip codeminded be>
• Subject: Re: [Tracker] [tracker-list] network support
• Date: Tue, 11 May 2010 23:43:50 +0400

Thank you for advices.
I will report how development going in this thread.

2010/5/11 Philip Van Hoof <philip codeminded be>:

On Tue, 2010-05-11 at 23:27 +0400, Dmitry Bashkatov wrote:

Of cause I will use some existing RPC server implementation. But
Apache is too heavy I think.
Thank you anyway! Now I am experementing with tracker dbus interface.

There exist a few lightweight webserver softwares. And some of them
allow you to use apache modules too. Perhaps check those out?

Ideally your code can be easily configured to be an apache module, or a
module for such a lightweight webserver.

Then we can let the code function as either of the two. Without
reinventing the same code for both situations.

Remember that although Apache might be heave in your eyes, that a lot of
systems already come with an Apache preinstalled. And then your service
can't allocate port 80 or 443, of course.

But if we integrate the solution with a few existing webserver
softwares, it might work out just fine. Maybe with a fallback that
listens on a port all by itself.

Note that we wont enable listening on any port like this unless the
service has SSL and authentication.

You can probably understand that exposing all of a user's metadata on
the bloody Internet isn't the brightest idea security and privacy
wise? :)


Cheers,

Philip

2010/5/11 Philip Van Hoof <spam pvanhoof be>:

On Tue, 2010-05-11 at 22:26 +0400, Dmitry Bashkatov wrote:

Hello!
I'm going to try to add network support for tracker. Realization will
not affect main code base. There will be daemon that sits on server
and talks to tracker-store using dbus, opening network RPC interface.
What do you think about this idea?

Why don't you just make an apache module that converts the results that
you get from DBus to RDFXML? http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-rdf-syntax/

You might have to do a bit of setuid()-ing to get the right session bus
from DBus. Maybe this: http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.1/suexec.html ?

http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.1/mod/mod_suexec.html#suexecusergroup

If you do it as an apache module then you'll get all the security
features of Apache for free. Like https, and authentication.

http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/howto/auth.html

Surely you don't want your custom server to implement all that stuff if
Apache has done it all already?

Cheers

Philip


--


Philip Van Hoof
freelance software developer
Codeminded BVBA - http://codeminded.be

--


Philip Van Hoof
freelance software developer
Codeminded BVBA - http://codeminded.be

--- End Message ---