Package: libapache-mod-auth-shadow (1.4-2)

An Apache module for authentication using /etc/shadow

When performing this task one encounters one fundamental difficulty: The /etc/shadow file is supposed to be read/writable only by root. However, the webserver is supposed to run under a non-root user, such as "www-data".

mod_auth_shadow addresses this difficulty by opening a pipe to an SGID shadow program "validate", which does the actual validation. When there is a failure, validate writes an error message to the system log, and waits three seconds before exiting.

Tags: System Administration: User Management, Software Development: Libraries, User Interface: World Wide Web, Network Protocol: HTTP, Role: Plugin, Security: Authentication, Application Suite: Apache