WWW94: the phoenix project: distributed hypermedia authoring
presented by m.g. lavenant & j.a. kruper, university of chicago, USA
introduction
the biological sciences division of the university of chicago decided that
they would like to setup an information system based on the web. but they
felt that the current implementations of the WWW software had two significant
limitations: the lack of an userfriendly cross-platform HTML editor and
rudimentary wide-area authentication and authorization services. the goals
of the phoenix project were to overcome these problems by providing an
X-Windows based WYSIWYG HTML browser/editor and integrated wide-area
authentication and authorization support for HTTP services.
a WYSIWYG HTML editor
the phoenix HTML editor was built around the tkWWW. it runs locally on UNIX
systems and remotely on PCs and MACs via X-server software. while the editor
allows direct access to HTML, it also provides a userfriendly interface to
HTML constructs. the phoenix editor supports the currently implemented
provisions of the proposed HTML+ specifications.
authentication
authentication is implemented using a dedicated division-wide Kerberos
server. when a phoenix client is started, it prompts the user for a login
password and obtains a so called "ticket" from the Kerberos server.
when a client accesses a phoenix server, this ticket is used to authenticate
the user. this mechanism allows to identify each access request without
asking the user's password over and over again.
authorization
to support authorization on a document basis, the HTML+ specifications were
extended by a so called "access control file". this is basically an URL
pointing to a file that contains access control information. this allows
easy access control for groups of documents because all documents that shall
have the same access control settings can point to the same access control
file.
i have no link information for this paper on the web.
3rd_day_phoenix /
13-jun-94 (ra) /
reto ambühler
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