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If someone asks that PAM is a user authentication method?

Then can we say yes? Or no?

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  • PAM = Pluggable authentication module?
    – Braiam
    Jun 17, 2014 at 19:11
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    Have you done any research on PAM? It's not a simple subject, and the question can be interpreted a number of ways.
    – phemmer
    Jun 17, 2014 at 19:11
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    No. A system is not a method.
    – Nils
    Jun 17, 2014 at 19:55
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    "A system is not a method" sounds oxymoronic to me, considering that systematic and methodical are near synonyms. The answer here depends on context. IMO it is probably yes, but if the context is "I'm playing semantic games with someone", then it is either yes or no, but either way you will be wrong ;)
    – goldilocks
    Jun 17, 2014 at 20:07
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    @goldilocks - just for fun, let's assume we are playing [a] semantic game. To that end I'll play dictionary.com's 4th definition of system: a coordinated body of methods or a scheme or plan of procedure
    – mikeserv
    Jun 17, 2014 at 21:44

1 Answer 1

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No.

PAM is a framework for authentication using different pam modules. The benefit to this is that application developers do not have to write the authentication logic themselves; e.g. it provides standards: from man 7 pam: Linux-PAM is a system of libraries that handle the authentication tasks of applications (services) on the system.

PAM does provide user authentication, but it also provides other things such as system limits (pam_limits), motd (pam_motd), shell validation (pam_shell), LDAP authentication (pam_ldap), MySQL authentication (pam_mysql), etc.

You can see most of the functionality of pam by reading the system admins guide.

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    If PAM "does provide [a means or method of] user authentication", then how is the answer to the question "No"? This is like saying that a highway is not a method of transportation because it just provides a framework so that vehicles can do it for themselves. Never-the-less, a decent answer in terms of information.
    – goldilocks
    Jun 17, 2014 at 20:11
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    Hmm. Very well put. I retract my comment and will delete it. Thank you. I will not however retract the upvote I gave this post before even making it.
    – mikeserv
    Jun 17, 2014 at 21:27

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