Subject: Re: User Authentication ?

From: Jakub Narebski <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 11 Oct 2008 11:28:29 -0700 (PDT)

"Neshama Parhoti" <[email-masked]> writes:

> I want to setup a git server on the web but I need user
> authentication.
> 
> From what I understand, currently git-daemon does not support
> authentication.

The purpose of git-daemon is to allow fast (and bandwidth-saving)
anonymous read-only (fetch) access to git repositories.  The ability
to push via git-daemon was added later, and is turned off by default
because it should be used only in special situation.

> Is there any way to achieve that ?

The reason behind git-daemon not supporting authentication is that
re-implementing authentication poorly is a bad idea.

If you need authentication there is SSH that provides authentication
(for ssh:// protocol), or WebDAV (for HTTP push protocol). Perhaps
also future "smart" HTTP server would support some kind of
authentification...

> I really don't want to give ssh logins for people who I just want to
> be able to access my repository...

First, you can always set git-shell as shell for those git only
accounts. Second, you can set up Gitosis, which IIRC needs only single
account, and handles authentication by itself; I have heard also of
ssh_acl in this context...

I don't know if there is some other equivalent of Gitosis...

HTH
-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland
ShadeHawk on #git