I don't claim to be an expert in anything. Thus I don't believe I would be able to do a CGI authentication routine better than the Apache programmers.

You mean the HTTP protocol, not ASF developers. They've just implemented the protocol, not designed the auth routine.

About SSL and mod_perl, I preferred not to cite them. I preferred to focus on the intrinsic weaknesses of a self-made CGI authentication against an (already weak) basic authentication.

What are they? Apart from having to code it oneself, I fail to see the shortcomings. Basic auth is already as insecure as can be, it can't get any more insecure unless the CGI replacement is poorly implemented.

I subscribe your opinion on SSL and mod_perl, with a preference for SSL for the same reasons as before: personally I don't think I would be able to do with a self-made mod_perl handler a job better than SSL.

Bit of confusion I think, I never mentioned anything about writing your own SSL substitute in mod_perl, I merely mentioned you could use SSL to prevent evesdropping on the initial login, which in the case of a form would POST username and password details in even clearer (non-base64 encoded) text than basic auth.

Summing up yes you can do a better job with CGI than basic auth, at the expense of understanding and development time and the fact that clients may choose not to use cookies, and a CGI script must check each cookie on each request.

Steve.

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