onpassword

Hi, I have kind of a dumb question - when we set up a cluster, on the primary I used onpassword to generate $INFORMIXDIR/etc/passwd_file, but then for the other servers, we just copied the passwd_file. So...how does the secondary know what access key to use to read the file? -Justin

That's proprietary information. From: "Justin Killen" <jkillen@allamericanasphalt.com> To: ids@iiug.org Date: 12/24/2014 10:48 AM Subject: onpassword [34402] Sent by: ids-bounces@iiug.org Hi, I have kind of a dumb question - when we set up a cluster, on the prima= ry I used onpassword to generate $INFORMIXDIR/etc/passwd_file, but then for = the other servers, we just copied the passwd_file. So...how does the second= ary know what access key to use to read the file? -Justin ***********************************************************************= ******** Forum Note: Use "Reply" to post a response in the discussion forum. =

Of course it's proprietary - as is the rest of Informix. I think I may have been looking at this wrong. My assumption was that the access key provided at the command line was used as the encryption key, but that would mean that Informix would need to remember that key somewhere. It doesn't seem to be stored in the engine anywhere, as copying in a password file seems to work. Another option would be to have the encryption key in the file itself, but then that would defeat the purpose of encrypting it to begin with. So, my current assumption is that the encryption key used is some kind of generated string that is embedded into Informix somewhere. Then, the access key is just part of the file data, and is used exclusively by onpassword as an authorization method during the password file export/decrypt process. The docs mention that the file isn't portable between different platforms, so it's probably generated with the platform identifier as some sort of input, e.g. a salt value. Regardless, I think I've got my question answered - Informix doesn't need or use the access key for intra-server communications. -Justin -----Original Message----- From: ids-bounces@iiug.org [mailto:ids-bounces@iiug.org] On Behalf Of Madison Pruet Sent: Wednesday, December 24, 2014 9:29 AM To: ids@iiug.org Subject: Re: onpassword [34403] That's proprietary information. From: "Justin Killen" <jkillen@allamericanasphalt.com> To: ids@iiug.org Date: 12/24/2014 10:48 AM Subject: onpassword [34402] Sent by: ids-bounces@iiug.org Hi, I have kind of a dumb question - when we set up a cluster, on the prima= ry I used onpassword to generate $INFORMIXDIR/etc/passwd_file, but then for = the other servers, we just copied the passwd_file. So...how does the second= ary know what access key to use to read the file? -Justin ***********************************************************************= ******** Forum Note: Use "Reply" to post a response in the discussion forum. = ******************************************************************************* Forum Note: Use "Reply" to post a response in the discussion forum.