Generic Access Control in PHP

by | 2007-12-03 | It's a Code, Code World

Almost every application with multiple user groups requires an Access Control List (ACL) system. There are dozens of ACL implementations. Most of them are buried deep in the applications that use them. Some of them even provide generic capabilities that can be used by extensions (or applications, plug-ins, whatever) to that system.

So one would think that there would be a good generic ACL system out there, or that it would be possible to extract a good general purpose ACL module from another application. Not so. There’s one, phpGACL, that has a lot of capability. But the implementation is monolithic… it looks like another case of sticking a class declaration around a bunch of procedural code and calling it object based. That just won’t do.

There are quite capable applications for implementing ACL. LDAP being one of the best and most popular. But asking the administrator of a relatively simple application to install and configure LDAP on their shared hosting system is a lot to ask. Ideally, the mechanics of the ACL system should be intuitive to the user, if not essentially transparent.

So what else to do but write a new one? (more…)

I am a Unit Test Convert

by | 2007-11-29 | It's a Code, Code World

For any project where I’ve been managing more than one or two developers, I’ve always been a proponent of good testing and QA practises, but until fairly recently I wasn’t big on formal unit testing, especially in my one-man projects.

That’s changing, and fast. (more…)

Mastodon