[Rhodes22-list] New Beginnings - Da List

[John Lock]

At 01:08 PM 1/3/2008 -0500, Robert Skinner wrote:
>*  While we can assume that any server John puts
>    online will be internally secure, would it be
>    possible for Rhodies to log in and access the
>    site via a secure link so passwords, etc.
>    couldn't be intercepted?

Yes, that will be available (although not as "rhodes22.org").  This 
is a really esoteric topic and of little value for most list 
members.  Feel free to skip the rest unless you're a glutton for 
techie details.

The feature that Robert mentions is provided by an SSL certificate, 
purchased by the owning organization.  The SSL certificate does two 
things: 1) Once invoked, it encrypts all traffic between the client 
and the server, and 2) It confirms the identity of the website owner.

#2 is the problematic one because there is no "official" Rhodes 22 
owner organization.  Therefore a certificate authority will not issue 
a certificate to an organization that does not exist.

We get around that by using generic certificates based on the 
identity of the hosting provider, rather than the hosted 
organization.  That means - instead of using a web address like 
https://www.rhodes22.org/ to invoke the SSL feature, it might look 
something like https://raeid22.raenet.com/rhodes22/  (just 
speculating here because I haven't set it up yet).

The end result is a secured connection without having to purchase and 
maintain a private SSL certificate.  The only side-effect is having 
to use different URLs for the secured portions of the website.  This 
is of little concern to most users,  since you will most likely just 
follow links in web pages, which would coded to take all this into account.

Cheers!

John Lock
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s/v Pandion - '79 Rhodes 22
Lake Sinclair, GA
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