[iOS] Ask password not encrypted?

[Ken Ray]

> Why are strings encrypted? I "vaguely" understand the concept, but the expression is bandied about so freely that I figure someone must know something that I don't know. Unless it serves a purpose beyond what I think it does, it seems to me to just overly complicate things that are already pretty complicated. I don't like the thought of dealing with more levels of complication than is absolutely necessary. Of course, I can be pretty naive about some things! (smile) Also, I'm honest and I understand that much of the world is not.

Bottom line is that it gives you a way to get an encrypted string instead of providing your own encryption/decryption functions.

If you have your own encrypt/decrypt functions you like to use, you don't need to have 'ask password' encrypt it for you. And actually, as was recently mentioned, there's an "mcEncrypt" function that you can run separately to give you the same thing "ask password" gives you automatically. This is useful if you want to add something you want to store with the password, but use the same encryption:

Compare:

ask password "Password:"
put it into tEncryptedString

(later)
ask password "Password:"
if it = tEncryptedString then
   -- let 'em in
else
   -- wrong password
   -- don't let 'em in
end if

VERSUS:

ask password clear "Password:"
put it into tUnencryptedString
put "Ken Ray" into tUserName
put mcEncrypt(tUserName & cr & tUnencryptedString) into tEncryptedString

(later)
ask password clear "Password:"
if mcEncrypt("Ken Ray" & cr & it) = tEncryptedString then
   -- let 'em in
else
   -- right person/wrong password OR
   -- wrong person/right password
   -- either way, don't let 'em in
end if

Of course there is no "mcDecrypt", so it's kind of a specialized use of mcEncrypt. Personally I either use 'ask password clear'or I use a custom stack for getting passwords and use my own custom encryption/decryption functions, but that's just me…


Ken Ray
Sons of Thunder Software, Inc.
Email: kray at sonsothunder.com
Web Site: http://www.sonsothunder.com/