internal_v_smechname(3)

✨ internal_v_smechname — Internal names and mechanism names ✨

okay bestie, welcome to the Heimdal GSS-API library manual page for internal_v_smechname(3). it's giving niche but honestly? iconic. let's get into it 🫶

🌸 NAME 🌸

internal_v_smechname — Internal names and mechanism names 💅

🦋 Name forms 🦋

so, plot twist: there are two name representations in GSS-API, and you gotta know both, fr fr.

• the Internal form
• the Contiguous string ('flat') form

and the way that gss_export_name() and gss_import_name() can be used to convert between the two forms?? lowkey the moment. 🔥

• the contiguous string form is described by an oid specifying the type and an octet string. a special form of the contiguous string form is the exported name object. the exported name is defined for each mechanism, and it's something that can be stored and compared later. the exported name is what should be used for ACL comparisons. periodt. 💅
• the Internal form is opaque to the application programmer and is implementation-dependent. like, don't even try to peek, bestie, it's not for you 🙈
• there's also a special form of the Internal Name (IN), and that is the Mechanism Name (MN). in the mechanism name all the generic information is stripped off and it only contains the information for one mechanism. in GSS-API some functions return MN and some require MN as input. each of these functions is marked up as such, so you'll know 👑

@FIXME Describe relationship between import_name, canonicalize_name, export_name and friends. Also, update for RFC2743 language ('contiguous' and 'flat' are gone, leaving just 'exported name token', 'internal', and 'MN').

and that's the whole vibe 🎀 this was Version 7.8.0, dated Tue Nov 15 2022, straight from the Heimdal GSS-API library besties. mwah, take care of your name forms 💖✨