# Java security

Matt LeMay (mlemay@earthlink.net)
Thu, 30 Jul 1998 23:53:47 -0600

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    Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1998 23:53:47 -0600

    From: Matt LeMay <mlemay@earthlink.net>

    To: java-security@java.sun.com

    Subject: Java security

I have tried three times now to learn Java, each time only to be
thwarted by buginess and trifling security violations. Currently, I am
trying to write an applet that allows users to upload files from their
local machines to a server. This is a small group of people who know
and trust me. All my applet needs to do is:

1) open a connection to a remote server to obtain the IP address of the
local machine. It must do this because, in my case, I have my computer
configured to work on a LAN that is not connected to the internet. It
has a hardcoded IP address that allows me to play games on that LAN.
The InetAddress.getLocalHost ().getHostAddress () method returns the
hardcoded IP of my local machine and not my ISP-assigned address.
AFAIK, I can get the ISP-assigned address only by connecting to a remote
site and using the getLocalAddress () member of Socket.

2) open a local file *that the user chooses* for reading and sending
(via sockets) to the remote server upon which I have an account.

However, as you well know, rather than, say, prompting the user and
asking if the applet can open a connection to, say, "www.lycos.com" on
the *HTTP* port (note not even on a telnet or ftp port), the draconian
security measures crush my applet like a '57 Buick in a junkyard. I
haven't even tried to open a local file for reading, as I imagine it
would trigger a communication with Sun that would cause Sun to send out
its thugs to break my kneecaps for attempting such a vile action,
whether or not the user "ok'd" or even *desired* such an action.

This, in conjunction with the buggieness mentioned above (how many times
I have to reboot my Windows '95 computer when I "push the Java envelope"
by trying to set the background color of an applet via the cryptic and
unreliable "paint" architecture, I dare not think about) and the User
Interface that can't hold a candle to a beginning XLib-programmers
endeavors lead me to believe that Java is not, as some seem to think,
the wave of the future. All this neglects to mention the complete API
overhauls from minor-version release to minor-version release of Java
and the manifest lack of serious applications "out there."

I have chosen to register this complaint because I have wasted the past
several days in a futile attempt to achieve the most meagre ends through
Java and I am well past being distraught over this situation. Perhaps I
should have stuck with the animated icon, marquee text, and
button-moving-when-you-try-to-click-them applets that Java devotee's
have heralded as "the end of Microsoft" lo these many years. In the
meanwhile, I have no choice but to seek a more mature development tool
to accomplish the most simplistic goals.

Thank you for the time you have taken to read this.

    --
    -Matt (mlemay@earthlink.net)

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