[cpp-netlib-devel] Security, Authentication and Encryption

[Glyn M. <gly...@gm...>]

Boost Networkers,


A few times on this list we have mentioned security without ever yet going
into any detail about it.  I believe this a rather fundamental aspect of
network programming and it would be wrong to design a networking library
without addressing this.  However, I do think that this is a whole other
application area and probably beyond the scope of boost.network.  But what
do other people on this list thing?

My thoughts:
I am not aware of anything in boost, or that's been proposed, in the domain
of security.  This is an area that moves rapidly and I can imagine its very
difficult for a library designer to keep abreast of all the changes.  Also
it can be quite tightly coupled to a particular protocol.  However, there
are definitely algorithms and techniques which are used repeatedly by
application developers and which definitely belong in a re-usable library or
framework.

Does anyone think it is possible to develop security software for our own
requirements and eventually fork should someone have the interest or will to
take it on?  What do people normally do when they require authentication /
encryption?  I often find it difficult to set out a clear policy of this,
and the code I and my co-developers write is often rather disorganised.
Therefore I think its a good candidate for considering developing a library
or framework for addressing this, or at the very least determining a clear
boost.network policy.

Any comments?
G