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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE refentry PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.5//EN"
	"http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.5/docbookx.dtd" [
<!ENTITY COMMANDNAME "usplash">
<!ENTITY TIMESTAMP "2019-02-10">
<!ENTITY % common SYSTEM "../common.ent">
%common;
]>

<refentry xmlns:xi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XInclude">
  <refentryinfo>
    <title>Mandos Manual</title>
    <!-- NWalsh’s docbook scripts use this to generate the footer: -->
    <productname>Mandos</productname>
    <productnumber>&version;</productnumber>
    <date>&TIMESTAMP;</date>
    <authorgroup>
      <author>
	<firstname>Björn</firstname>
	<surname>Påhlsson</surname>
	<address>
	  <email>belorn@recompile.se</email>
	</address>
      </author>
      <author>
	<firstname>Teddy</firstname>
	<surname>Hogeborn</surname>
	<address>
	  <email>teddy@recompile.se</email>
	</address>
      </author>
    </authorgroup>
    <copyright>
      <year>2008</year>
      <year>2009</year>
      <year>2010</year>
      <year>2011</year>
      <year>2012</year>
      <year>2013</year>
      <year>2014</year>
      <year>2015</year>
      <year>2016</year>
      <year>2017</year>
      <year>2018</year>
      <year>2019</year>
      <holder>Teddy Hogeborn</holder>
      <holder>Björn Påhlsson</holder>
    </copyright>
    <xi:include href="../legalnotice.xml"/>
  </refentryinfo>
  
  <refmeta>
    <refentrytitle>&COMMANDNAME;</refentrytitle>
    <manvolnum>8mandos</manvolnum>
  </refmeta>
  
  <refnamediv>
    <refname><command>&COMMANDNAME;</command></refname>
    <refpurpose>Mandos plugin to use usplash to get a
    password.</refpurpose>
  </refnamediv>
  
  <refsynopsisdiv>
    <cmdsynopsis>
      <command>&COMMANDNAME;</command>
    </cmdsynopsis>
  </refsynopsisdiv>
  
  <refsect1 id="description">
    <title>DESCRIPTION</title>
    <para>
      This program prompts for a password using <citerefentry>
      <refentrytitle>usplash</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum>
      </citerefentry> and outputs any given password to standard
      output.  If no <citerefentry><refentrytitle
      >usplash</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry>
      process can be found, this program will immediately exit with an
      exit code indicating failure.
    </para>
    <para>
      This program is not very useful on its own.  This program is
      really meant to run as a plugin in the <application
      >Mandos</application> client-side system, where it is used as a
      fallback and alternative to retrieving passwords from a
      <application >Mandos</application> server.
    </para>
    <para>
      If this program is killed (presumably by
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>plugin-runner</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8mandos</manvolnum></citerefentry> because some other
      plugin provided the password), it cannot tell <citerefentry>
      <refentrytitle>usplash</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum>
      </citerefentry> to abort requesting a password, because
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>usplash</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry> does not support this.
      Therefore, this program will then <emphasis>kill</emphasis> the
      running <citerefentry><refentrytitle>usplash</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry> process and start a
      <emphasis>new</emphasis> one using the same command line
      arguments as the old one was using.
    </para>
  </refsect1>
  
  <refsect1 id="options">
    <title>OPTIONS</title>
    <para>
      This program takes no options.
    </para>
  </refsect1>
  
  <refsect1 id="exit_status">
    <title>EXIT STATUS</title>
    <para>
      If exit status is 0, the output from the program is the password
      as it was read.  Otherwise, if exit status is other than 0, the
      program was interrupted or encountered an error, and any output
      so far could be corrupt and/or truncated, and should therefore
      be ignored.
    </para>
  </refsect1>
  
  <refsect1 id="environment">
    <title>ENVIRONMENT</title>
    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
	<term><envar>cryptsource</envar></term>
	<term><envar>crypttarget</envar></term>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    If set, these environment variables will be assumed to
	    contain the source device name and the target device
	    mapper name, respectively, and will be shown as part of
	    the prompt.
	</para>
	<para>
	  These variables will normally be inherited from
	  <citerefentry><refentrytitle>plugin-runner</refentrytitle>
	  <manvolnum>8mandos</manvolnum></citerefentry>, which will
	  normally have inherited them from
	  <filename>/scripts/local-top/cryptroot</filename> in the
	  initial <acronym>RAM</acronym> disk environment, which will
	  have set them from parsing kernel arguments and
	  <filename>/conf/conf.d/cryptroot</filename> (also in the
	  initial RAM disk environment), which in turn will have been
	  created when the initial RAM disk image was created by
	  <filename
	  >/usr/share/initramfs-tools/hooks/cryptroot</filename>, by
	  extracting the information of the root file system from
	  <filename >/etc/crypttab</filename>.
	</para>
	<para>
	  This behavior is meant to exactly mirror the behavior of
	  <command>askpass</command>, the default password prompter.
	</para>
	</listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </refsect1>
  
  <refsect1 id="files">
    <title>FILES</title>
    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
	<term><filename>/dev/.initramfs/usplash_fifo</filename></term>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    This is the <acronym>FIFO</acronym> to where this program
	    will write the commands for <citerefentry><refentrytitle
	    >usplash</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum>
	    </citerefentry>.  See <citerefentry><refentrytitle
	    >fifo</refentrytitle><manvolnum>7</manvolnum>
	    </citerefentry>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
	<term><filename>/dev/.initramfs/usplash_outfifo</filename></term>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    This is the <acronym>FIFO</acronym> where this program
	    will read the password from <citerefentry><refentrytitle
	    >usplash</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum>
	    </citerefentry>.  See <citerefentry><refentrytitle
	    >fifo</refentrytitle><manvolnum>7</manvolnum>
	    </citerefentry>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
	<term><filename class="directory">/proc</filename></term>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    To find the running <citerefentry><refentrytitle
	    >usplash</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum>
	    </citerefentry>, this directory will be searched for
	    numeric entries which will be assumed to be directories.
	    In all those directories, the <filename>exe</filename> and
	    <filename>cmdline</filename> entries will be used to
	    determine the name of the running binary, effective user
	    and group <abbrev>ID</abbrev>, and the command line
	    arguments.  See <citerefentry><refentrytitle
	    >proc</refentrytitle><manvolnum>5</manvolnum>
	    </citerefentry>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
	<term><filename>/sbin/usplash</filename></term>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    This is the name of the binary which will be searched for
	    in the process list.  See <citerefentry><refentrytitle
	    >usplash</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum>
	    </citerefentry>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </refsect1>
  
  <refsect1 id="bugs">
    <title>BUGS</title>
    <para>
      Killing <citerefentry><refentrytitle>usplash</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry> and starting a new one
      is ugly, but necessary as long as it does not support aborting a
      password request.
    </para>
    <xi:include href="../bugs.xml"/>
  </refsect1>
  
  <refsect1 id="example">
    <title>EXAMPLE</title>
    <para>
      Note that normally, this program will not be invoked directly,
      but instead started by the Mandos <citerefentry><refentrytitle
      >plugin-runner</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8mandos</manvolnum>
      </citerefentry>.
    </para>
    <informalexample>
      <para>
	This program takes no options.
      </para>
      <para>
	<userinput>&COMMANDNAME;</userinput>
      </para>
    </informalexample>
  </refsect1>
  
  <refsect1 id="security">
    <title>SECURITY</title>
    <para>
      If this program is killed by a signal, it will kill the process
      <abbrev>ID</abbrev> which at the start of this program was
      determined to run <citerefentry><refentrytitle
      >usplash</refentrytitle><manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry>
      as root (see also <xref linkend="files"/>).  There is a very
      slight risk that, in the time between those events, that process
      <abbrev>ID</abbrev> was freed and then taken up by another
      process; the wrong process would then be killed.  Now, this
      program can only be killed by the user who started it; see
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>plugin-runner</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8mandos</manvolnum></citerefentry>.  This program
      should therefore be started by a completely separate
      non-privileged user, and no other programs should be allowed to
      run as that special user.  This means that it is not recommended
      to use the user "nobody" to start this program, as other
      possibly less trusted programs could be running as "nobody", and
      they would then be able to kill this program, triggering the
      killing of the process <abbrev>ID</abbrev> which may or may not
      be <citerefentry><refentrytitle>usplash</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry>.
    </para>
    <para>
      The only other thing that could be considered worthy of note is
      this:  This program is meant to be run by <citerefentry>
      <refentrytitle>plugin-runner</refentrytitle><manvolnum
      >8mandos</manvolnum></citerefentry>, and will, when run
      standalone, outside, in a normal environment, immediately output
      on its standard output any presumably secret password it just
      received.  Therefore, when running this program standalone
      (which should never normally be done), take care not to type in
      any real secret password by force of habit, since it would then
      immediately be shown as output.
    </para>
  </refsect1>
  
  <refsect1 id="see_also">
    <title>SEE ALSO</title>
    <para>
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>intro</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8mandos</manvolnum></citerefentry>,
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>crypttab</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>5</manvolnum></citerefentry>,
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>fifo</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>7</manvolnum></citerefentry>,
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>plugin-runner</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8mandos</manvolnum></citerefentry>,
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>proc</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>5</manvolnum></citerefentry>,
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>usplash</refentrytitle>
      <manvolnum>8</manvolnum></citerefentry>
    </para>
  </refsect1>
</refentry>
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