Dante development survey

• Inferno FTP/HTTP server
  
• Manually installed via Operating System package (rpm/deb/etc.)
• Preinstalled on Operating System

• Client
  
• Server

Possible additions

Below is a list of some possible additions. If you use or are planning to use Dante, we would appreciate if you could take the time to indicate what you would like see be given a high priority. Check the box next to the options you would like implemented, and press send at the bottom when you have finished.

Note that choosing all options will not help prioritization; choosing one or two options is more likely to be effective.

The server logfiles contain much usage information, including duration of sessions, amount of data transferred, protocols used, time of day, username, etc. A log analysis program could analyze the logfiles and provide a detailed visual overview of usage patterns.

A graphical interface to administer the server. This could involve including operations such as starting and stopping the server, adding new rules, etc.

The server is a very suitable point for gathering statistics about network usage (SNMP, Netflow, etc.). A module with access to the data passing through the server could be used to generate statistics, for example with an SNMP interface.

Compared to router or wire-level analysis, the server has direct access to all the data passing through it without having to perform packet reassembly or similar operations. This makes it a suitable point for doing data analysis. Having a set of application level protocol decoders and an interface for accessing or manipulating the data passing through the server would make it possible for users to write specialized modules that could perform tasks such as logging Internet usage (URLs) or interfacing the server to other services such as virus killers or spam filters.

The server is able to store the data contents of the packets and connections that passes through it. Currently data logging is done to the standard log file, but a specialized mechanism could be added to handle storage of large amounts of data in a scalable way. An SQL-like syntax could be used to query and access the stored data.

Such as one time passwords (S/Key) or SASL.

Firewall traversal/server chaining (socks servers talking to other socks servers). This is currently supported for TCP connect but not UDP.

The latest draft for rfc1928 allows binding of UDP sockets.

Several nonstandard extensions exists in other implementations.

• traceroute. Allows the traceroute application to work through the socks server.
• ping. Allows sending/receiving of ICMP ECHO/ICMP ECHO REPLY.

Several applications come with application specific proxy protocols (e.g. realaudio). A server for these applications which talks to the client using its protocol and relays connections through the SOCKS server would remove the need for opening new holes to use the application in a firewall environment.

On most platforms a probably substantial improvement could be achieved by the addition of an interface similar to splice(), which allows the connection of a pair of descriptors in the kernel, removing the need for the data in the connection to pass through the user address space.

There are still several platforms that are not supported. Note that reporting problems to dante-bugs is the best way to get support for new platforms.

Usage and comments

How do you make use of Dante?
If you have any other comments, please also provide them in the text field below.

If you wish, you can provide us with your email address, if you want us to contact you, should we have any comments or questions regarding your suggestions.
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