Doc/lib/libbastion.tex

\section{\module{Bastion} ---
         Providing restricted access to objects.}
\declaremodule{standard}{Bastion}

\modulesynopsis{Providing restricted access to objects.}


% I'm concerned that the word 'bastion' won't be understood by people
% for whom English is a second language, making the module name
% somewhat mysterious.  Thus, the brief definition... --amk

According to the dictionary, a bastion is ``a fortified area or
position'', or ``something that is considered a stronghold.''  It's a
suitable name for this module, which provides a way to forbid access
to certain attributes of an object.  It must always be used with the
\module{rexec} module, in order to allow restricted-mode programs access
to certain safe attributes of an object, while denying access to
other, unsafe attributes.

% I've punted on the issue of documenting keyword arguments for now.

\begin{funcdesc}{Bastion}{object\optional{, filter\optional{,
                          name\optional{, class}}}}
Protect the object \var{object}, returning a bastion for the
object.  Any attempt to access one of the object's attributes will
have to be approved by the \var{filter} function; if the access is
denied an \exception{AttributeError} exception will be raised.

If present, \var{filter} must be a function that accepts a string
containing an attribute name, and returns true if access to that
attribute will be permitted; if \var{filter} returns false, the access
is denied.  The default filter denies access to any function beginning
with an underscore (\samp{_}).  The bastion's string representation
will be \samp{<Bastion for \var{name}>} if a value for
\var{name} is provided; otherwise, \samp{repr(\var{object})} will be
used.

\var{class}, if present, should be a subclass of \class{BastionClass}; 
see the code in \file{bastion.py} for the details.  Overriding the
default \class{BastionClass} will rarely be required.
\end{funcdesc}


\begin{classdesc}{BastionClass}{getfunc, name}
Class which actually implements bastion objects.  This is the default
class used by \function{Bastion()}.  The \var{getfunc} parameter is a
function which returns the value of an attribute which should be
exposed to the restricted execution environment when called with the
name of the attribute as the only parameter.  \var{name} is used to
construct the \function{repr()} of the \class{BastionClass} instance.
\end{classdesc}