#240 Networking: what about SSH ??

[Anonymous]

Hi,

There are ssh library for ruby, for python but NOTHING for tcl !!

I am really talking about SSH (not SSL).

I think it could be a part of the Networking module and you could start with an ssh client (i.e not server).

for ssh see:
http://www.ssh.com/products/ssh_secure_shell/

http://www.googlesyndicatedsearch.com/u/ietf?hl=fr&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=ssh&btnG=Rechercher

thank you
bye
FD

[Larry W. Virden]

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tcllib is a tcl script only collection of modules.

I suspect what you are after will turn out to require some C bindings to some library.

I suggest posting a request for someone to write what you are after over on comp.lang.tcl (see google news for one way to access that newsgroup).

[Larry W. Virden]

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I just took a look at the ruby and perl net::ssh modules. Normally you won't see Tcl do a lot of that. It isn't that it isn't possible. Most Tcl programmers don't bother. They prefer to use exec to invoke ssh directly to get done what needs to be done.

The other thing you will tend to see in the Tcl community is self-motivation. That is to say, needs tend to be met by the people who have the needs.

This kind of dove tails with my first point. Since most tcl developers use exec, few have encountered a need for a more direct binding. Things that need a more secure layer between processes use TLS (ie ssl) and things that need functionality of ssh use ssh.

It's a different cultural outlook - that not everything need be done within the language.

However, if you have a strong need for it, I am sure that you will find help as you develop the Tcl extension.

[Michael Schlenker]

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There is more than one reason Tcllib does not have an ssh module currently, the most compelling reason: No one has committed code for it yet...

But for some other reasons:
1. Expect. Its nearly trivial to automate ssh interactions in Tcl with the Expect package, no need to implement the protocol in Tcl itself and having the maintainence burden.
2. Speed. A plain Tcl version of a crypt protocol may be doable in reasonable speed with Tcl 8.5s arbitrary length integer support, otherwise it would be really slow.
3. Other secure IPC. Tcllib has the comm package, which, paired with TLS is quite a good solution for remote access, no need to add ssh to the mix if you control server and client.

[Nobody/Anonymous]

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In this case, the use of "exec" make it not portable.
The problem won't be on Linux, but
ssh is not an internal command on Win.