[darcs-users] ssh path

[Jorey Bump]

Alexander Staubo wrote, at 11/23/2007 09:52 AM:

> In the Unix world -- meaning pretty much everywhere outside Microsoft
> shops -- SSH is all-pervasive, and has been for the last ten years or
> so, whereas WebDAV is a standard widely seen to have failed miserably
> (in part due to its complexity), now a niche technology largely
> relevant to calendaring, being supplanted by the Atom [1] for other
> applications such as publishing. For Subversion, svn+ssh seems more
> common than WebDAV these days.

[snip]

> ...I think I will revise my
> perspective of WebDAV: a flawed technology that is, somehow, wildly
> popular on some planet I don't care about visiting, but popular
> nonetheless.

I use SSH with public key authentication dozens of times every day. It's 
so painless and convenient, I've often been mystified that SSH hasn't 
been bundled with Windows since Windows '98 (but then, full Remote 
Desktop support isn't standard with all versions of Windows, either, so 
I shouldn't be surprised).

Nonetheless, while I use SSH on *NIX systems and enjoy its convenience 
and flexibility as an administrator, there is one area not mentioned by 
the OP where WebDAV may have an advantage: Virtual user support for file 
transfers. WebDAV may still have some administration and usability 
issues (I only use it for a calendar server and have set up mod_dav_svn 
for others), but I'm extremely reluctant to give full shell access to a 
user that only needs SFTP support. FTP, SCP, SFTP and WebDAV (using 
digest authentication and/or SSL) all have significant caveats, not the 
least of which is widespread client support. Sadly, none of them would 
compare to rsync with virtual user support, SASL integration, and 
encryption via TLS. When I can, I do all of my file tranfers using 
rsync+ssh, and and it blows everything else away. It would be nice if 
something similar was available to general users without posing a 
security risk.