Subject: Re: Java GSS bindings

From: Mayank Upadhyay <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 6 Dec 1998 17:42:15 -0800 (PST)

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> To: [email-masked]
> From: Michael Smith <[email-masked]>
> Subject: Java GSS bindings
> 
> The only issue raised by the group to date has been regarding the 
usage of
> concrete classes vs interfaces in the specification. We would like 
to solicit
> any other opinions and comments with respect to this issue.
> 

My opinion is that the GSS-API bindings should consist of concrete 
classes.

I look at the GSS-API layer in the following way: An implementation of 
the GSS-API is a framework provided by one vendor which can allow 
different security mechanisms from one or more vendors to plug in 
underneath it.

Therefore, I would imagine that the following would be true of any 
GSS-API implementation:

(a) It would consist of classes that provide all functionality needed 
to form a middle layer between the application and the security 
mechanisms.

(b) It would consist of interfaces for underlying security mechanisms 
that need to be implemented by any mechanism that wishes to plug 
underneath this particular implementation of the GSS-API.

In defining the Java bindings we are attempting to standardize how a 
subset of the classes in (a) would look. These are just those classes 
that the application programmer would reference in his/her code. Since 
these classes will contain all functionality they need and since they 
are not the ones that have to be mixed and matched between different 
vendors, I'm not quite sure what interfaces classes will buy us here.

My understanding is that you would want to use an interface or an 
abstract class in a Java API when you are expecting to get a concrete
implementation of it from elsewhere at run-time, which plugs-in 
underneath, somehow.

You would use concrete classes when you can provide all functionality 
in your classes. (You can still allow the user to replace one of your 
classes with their own by simply extending yours, or you could forbid 
them from doing so by making your class final.)

Regards,
Mayank

---
Mayank Upadhyay
Sun Microsystems Inc.
(650) 786-4282

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From: Michael Smith <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 07 Dec 1998 07:44:48 -0500

At 10:13 PM 12/6/98 -0800, "michael.eisler" <[email-masked]> wrote:
>
>
>> prudish. -- Nobody wants to be more Catholic than the Pope, and 
>> after all here I am debating with a guy from Sun. 
>
>Not sure what is meant by this last phrase.
>

Nothing  intended to be offensive; merely stating the obvious, 
that on matters related to Java, Sun is in a position (like 
the gorilla in the old joke) to sit pretty much wherever
it likes. 

--Michael Smith
  [email-masked]