Dinah McNutt
Tivoli Systems
This paper defines requirements for a role-based system administration environment. It describes and compares traditional solutions such as restricted shells, multiple root accounts, and setuid programs. The comparisons are made in the context of the requirements defined and are used to introduce the motivation and need for an alternative solution.
The solution proposed in this paper is object oriented and is based on the draft POSIX 1003.7 standard. Where appropriate, specific implementations (such as the Tivoli Management Environment) will be referenced. These examples will include lessons learned at Tivoli in developing and using an object-oriented system administration tool.
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