[MUD-Dev] Introduction System

[J C Lawrence]

On Fri, 14 Jul 2000 01:32:54 -0500 
Eli Stevens <wickedgrey at wickedgrey.com> wrote:

> I must respectfully differ.  While there I do not see any danger
> in a single player having another players "true name" (be it an
> account/character pair, an ID number, whatever it is that uniquely
> identifies that player), storing the data on the client side would
> allow two players to compare notes.  

Aye, I definitely wrote without considering the implications there,
and this is another exposure with putting the namespace locally.  If
you are masking identity, its not wise to put identity in the
client's hands.

> Of course, if you can devise a system to do this without using a
> true name, then this would not be a problem...

A system could likely be worked out with one-way functions, but I
rather doubt its worth it, or the compute load it would entail.

> Perhaps the server could mangle the true name before sending it to
> the client, and just insure that it will be mangled the same way
> every time (but differently on a per-player basis)?  But any
> algorithmic mangling could be reversed engineered to the original
> state...  

Which is why you have to use on-way functions, perhaps with the
player's ObjectID as a salt.  Unless your namspaces get large (which
makes cache management on large multiplayer systems a problem) I
suspect there's not enough value in putting this locally.

Or are there any *really* cheap salted one-way functions out there?

> Perhaps I should find a different corner to think myself into?  ;)

O' what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.
Then again, practice makes perfect.

--
J C Lawrence                                 Home: claw at kanga.nu
---------(*)                               Other: coder at kanga.nu
http://www.kanga/nu/~claw/        Keys etc: finger claw at kanga.nu
--=| A man is as sane as he is dangerous to his environment |=--


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