[jsdl-wg] POSIX UID/GID

[Christopher Smith]

I think the username itself is good enough. It's actually common to see the
same username with different uids on different hosts, so I actually find
uids not very useful. In some cases in LSF we've even complicated our lives
by using uid and username.

-- Chris


On 13/4/05 07:34, "Karl Czajkowski" <karlcz at univa.com> wrote:

> If we can find a POSIX statement of allowed chars, to support
> automatic "type" detection by lexical analysis, I think we should do
> "User" (no "name" or "id") and the polymorphic semantics.  However,
> "sudo" requires a prepended "#" character to indicate a numeric ID in
> the generic username field of its command-line option syntax, so I am
> guessing POSIX may not have this guarantee.
> 
> Otherwise, I think we should use "UserName" and the name-only
> semantics.  I guess numeric ID is esoteric enough to handle through
> extensions if some subculture actually needs it?
> 
> Or, would it make sense to just treat the numeric IDs as optional
> attributes on the elements?  I guess we really want a
> mutually-exclusive specification of name/ID or else we need some sort
> of statement about consistency of these values?
> 
> 
> karl
> 
> 
> On Apr 13, Donal K. Fellows loaded a tape reading:
>> The telecon has decided to move the UID/GID bits from User to the POSIX
>> version of Application (whatever that's called; I'm behind tracking the
>> exact name of things right now). But a question has come up about the
>> meaning of the content of these elements.
>> 
>> It is obvious that they have to be able to accept usernames in their
>> xsd:string content (and I'm aware of systems with spaces in usernames,
>> even if this is not something I'd ever do myself) since they're how
>> POSIX user identities are exposed to users normal. However, with names
>> like they have, should they also accept numeric UIDs? I don't have a use
>> case for this (it's a detail I'd want to always hide) and I'm not aware
>> of anyone ever having a wholly numeric username.
>> 
>> As I see it, we have three options:
>>  * Current name, user-name semantics
>>  * Current name, user-name-and-uid semantics
>>  * Change name (to UserName?), user-name semantics
>> 
>> Which do people prefer? (GID handling should mirror UID handling)
>> 
>> Donal.