[Info-vax] Remote Data Access via File Share, ODBC (was: Re: Command Procedure Pipe output to a variable)

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2021-09-07 17:58:10 +0000, Simon Clubley said:

> One final question: If DAP would be so wonderful to the world in 
> general, then why isn't there a TCP/IP version of DAP ? (WebDAV doesn't 
> really count IMHO unless it's moved on recently). There's a 
> standardised TCP/IP version of every other application protocol.

The FAL/DAP analog is called ODBC, and the ODBC CLI API.

libferris (inactive) has the sorts of features that FAL/DAP might have 
had added, after substantial new development work.  Or Plan 9, the Unix 
analog to what DEC MICA was to OpenVMS, of course.

For those not needing ODBC or libferris or ilk, SMB and other shares 
meet the requirements for many if not most users.

VSI could certainly provide an ODBC client within RMS and an ODBC 
server akin to the DECnet FAL server. Or could route DAP over IP 
SSL/TLS if they were inclined. (Though IP integration on OpenVMS is 
weak, and SSL/TLS weaker.) Or the flexibility of something like the 
libferris FUSE. Having an SMB client would be nice, as many sites have 
substantial investments in SMB servers. But I digress.

Last substantive IP integration work I can recall was with OpenVMS 
V6.2, and work on a DECnet migration path has been sparse. DECnet was 
mostly-feature-frozen a ~quarter-century ago, too.

But if you're on an old and unsupported OpenVMS version and with old 
and unsupported tools and doing unsupported things such as parsing 
command output from DCL for an absent $getjpi feature, security is 
seemingly well down on the list of development considerations.

Coincidentally, Brian worked on part of an ODBC product allowing access 
into RMS files, IIRC.

And apropos of little else here, OpenSSL 3.0.0 (not to be confused with 
SSLv3) is now available. And the Windows Registry FUSE Filesystem 
(winregfs) is kinda cute.


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