openssh unix dev - Aug 2005 - Replacing WinInet functions with OpenSSH API Calls

All,

I'm working with a solution which makes use of the WinINet API  (FTP
functions) to FTP files from a Windows 2K client to a AIX server.  While
this works fine, my current client wants me to use Secure FTP.  They are
running OpenSSH 3.71p, and the requirements are to not change the server
side daemon, and only change my client calls. 

While I'm fine with this, my current implementation takes advantage of
WinINets ability to completely manage the file transfer session.  I'm
simply making calls to InternetOpen(), FtpPutFile() and
InternetCloseHandle().  Is there a possibility that I can make API level
calls with OpenSSH and replace my WinINet calls?  If so, I have not been
able to locate API's to do so, and would appreciate some pointers to
documentation. 

If there is an API available, or an API based solution, I'm interested
in FREE or purchasing a commercial version.  I just want to meet the
requirements of my customer.

Thank you,

Larry Welch

Welch, Larry wrote:
> All,
> 
> I'm working with a solution which makes use of the WinINet API  (FTP
> functions) to FTP files from a Windows 2K client to a AIX server.  While
> this works fine, my current client wants me to use Secure FTP.  They are
> running OpenSSH 3.71p, and the requirements are to not change the server
> side daemon, and only change my client calls. 
OpenSSH doesn't presently offer a library-style API. We would like to do
one, but is is not likely to happen soon (if ever) because it is a lot
of work.

On the other hand, you can run ssh at the end of a pipe and use it as a
transport by making reads and writes to/from the pipe. This is what scp,
sftp, cvs, rsync and a heap of other programs do.

Alternately, the sftp program supports batchfiles to automate transfers.
If you set up public key authentication, then you can use these to do
your work - your program could just write a batch file, run sftp and
check that it was successful.

-d

Thank you Damien.

Do you know of any commercial products which could provide me the APIs
which talk to the OpenSSH back end? My last resort would be to manage
the file transfer through my program, and I'm a bit concerned about
calling out because there will be hundreds of calls in a single
iteration of my program.

Cheers,

Larry

-----Original Message-----
From: Damien Miller [mailto:djm at mindrot.org] 
Sent: Tuesday, August 30, 2005 8:00 AM
To: Welch, Larry
Cc: openssh-unix-dev at mindrot.org
Subject: Re: Replacing WinInet functions with OpenSSH API Calls

Welch, Larry wrote:
> All,
> 
> I'm working with a solution which makes use of the WinINet API  (FTP
> functions) to FTP files from a Windows 2K client to a AIX server.
While
> this works fine, my current client wants me to use Secure FTP.  They
are
> running OpenSSH 3.71p, and the requirements are to not change the
server
> side daemon, and only change my client calls. 
OpenSSH doesn't presently offer a library-style API. We would like to do
one, but is is not likely to happen soon (if ever) because it is a lot
of work.

On the other hand, you can run ssh at the end of a pipe and use it as a
transport by making reads and writes to/from the pipe. This is what scp,
sftp, cvs, rsync and a heap of other programs do.

Alternately, the sftp program supports batchfiles to automate transfers.
If you set up public key authentication, then you can use these to do
your work - your program could just write a batch file, run sftp and
check that it was successful.

-d