Re: Is getpass(3) really obsolete?

[Eugene Syromyatnikov <evgsyr@gmail.com>]

On Fri, Oct 29, 2021 at 2:40 PM <rsbecker@nexbridge.com> wrote:
> getpass() is obsolete in POSIX.2. However, some platforms still are on POSIX.1, so replacing it instead of providing a configure detection/switch for it might cause issues.

POSIX.2 is not a newer POSIX version, but rather a book (“Shell and
utilities”) in pre-2001 standard revisions, and it has nothing to do
with the system interfaces (that is POSIX.1).
And the only mention of getpass() in POSIX (at least, since the 2001's
edition) indeed seems to be [1], in the list of functions that have
not been carried forward from XSH5, the 1997 revision of “System
Interfaces and Headers” (that is, SUSv2)[2], where it is inherited
from SUSv1[4] from XPG[5] and, as Alejandro already mentioned, marked
as obsolete, per XPG3 to XPG4 migration guide[6]; the previous, 1988,
version of POSIX[3] does not mention getpass() at all.

[1] https://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/basedefs/xbd_chap01.html
[2] https://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/7908799/xsh/getpass.html
[3] https://mirror.math.princeton.edu/pub/oldlinux/download/c953.pdf
[4] https://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9695969499/toc.pdf
[5] https://bitsavers.computerhistory.org/pdf/xOpen/X_Open_Portability_Guide_1985/xpg_2_xopen_system_v_specification_2.pdf
[6] http://archive.opengroup.org/publications/archive/CDROM/g501.pdf

-- 
Eugene Syromyatnikov
mailto:evgsyr@gmail.com
xmpp:esyr@jabber.{ru|org}