Paul Blackburn wrote:
> 
> One of the key features of AFS which is really important to me
> as a site AFS administrator is its reliability.
> 
> In about five years experience (AFS on AIX), I have seen few
> glitches with AFS sometimes introduced with new releases but these
> have been sorted out pretty quickly. Most "AFS problems" I have dealt
> with are really network outages or mis-configuration issues.
> 
> AFS software seems to have become more "solid and robust" over time.

One would hope that this is true of all software.  (If there's a product
for which it isn't true, I would hope you would punt the vendor!)

> 
> >From my point of view, encryption would appear to be the least
> asked for capability. Posit: more users want reliability and performance.
> 
> Encryption? There are many ways to do that already.
> Also, if encryption is your top issue, disconnect from the net
> and get into your Faraday cage.
> 
> So (to Transarc), yes, do look to new capabilities (encryption,
> Episode, alternative authentication) but, whatever new stuff
> you bring in, please please don't degrade the excellence of AFS.

I think this discussion is being rehashed because the information in the
paper, http://http.cs.berkeley.edu/~gauthier/endpoint-security.html is
still relevant.  

As a matter of fact, new options were introduced into the DFS spec with
version 1.2.   (Don't know if any of the vendors will deliver them,
however).   

BTW, there's a widely used Systems Management Framework that suffers
from similar problems.   It flaunts its use of encryption, when in fact
there is no authentication of the data payload in a majority of the
cases.

-- 
Chris Cowan                       
[EMAIL PROTECTED]                 
512-342-3635 (always)
614-677-3784 (until 6/1/98)
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