[DotGNU]Signing Webservices ?

[Chris Smith]

There is a requirement for some classes of webservice to be able to 'break 
out' of the sandbox and have access to low-level DGEE resources such as the 
Goldwater message queue API etc.

If certain webservices are allowed to do this it makes the design of the dgee 
administration services a lot simpler, also the Abdabi front-end webservices.
It also means that we can extend the functionality of the DGEE by adding 
webservices - so we're using the DGEE to support the DGEE :o)

For the DGEE to allow webservices access to strictly private internal 
resources it needs some machanism by which it may 'trust' the webservice.

Possible solutions include signing, known message digests etc.

Whatever solutions are proposed the DGEE _cannot_ impose a penalty on 
webservice invoking because it has to verify the webservice each time.

When the DGEE VM's load a webservice and are about to invoke it to satisfy a 
request it must set a security level for that webservice to control what 
internal resources it can see (This is different to the whole concept of 
sandboxing the filesystem etc.. that cannot be done this way without 
intercepting calls to the OS etc.. anyway, that's another discussion :o)

So when we have a webservice in a buffer in memory, how can we know it's one 
of a set of known 'trusted' webservices that are basically part of the DGEE 
infrastructure ?

[ An idea occurs to me... every webservice has a dgmx resource file.  This 
file contains a notion of an owner, and a public key and will probably be 
signed.. perhaps we can do something with that?
Perhaps 'lowlevel' webservices need to be signed by the DotGNU group.... but 
how will that work if you're building from src?
Or  even these 'lowlevel' webservices live under a special private namespace.  
The DGEE recognises this and fetches them from a very private an local area 
on disc instead of the resource manager.]

Hmm, I'm happiest with the latter idea as it's the simplest and probably as 
secure as anything else especially if this chosen namespace is strictly 
private.

Hmm, I've started to think out loud.  Sorry :o)

(Note these webservices are not 'installable' like normal webservices - they 
are part and parcel of the DGEE and cannot be added or removed).


It's on the table for discussion.
Thoughs, ideas, and fix-everything solutions greatfully received.

Chris

-- 
Chris Smith
  Technical Architect - netFluid Technology Ltd.
  "Internet Technologies, Distributed Systems and Tuxedo Consultancy"
  E: address@hidden  W: http://www.nfluid.co.uk