ssh-agent on Mac OS X 10.5
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Steve Madsen
ssh-agent on Mac OS X 10.5

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been using a tool called SSHKeychain on Mac OS X to manage ssh-agent and my identities, to make logging into remote servers secure, yet password-free.

Lately, however, something has changed and SSHKeychain isn’t able to keep track of my keys. The result is that instead of rarely typing my passphrases, I’m doing it constantly. I think it started around the time I updated to 10.5.8.

Turns out that Leopard has much better support for ssh-agent built-in and SSHKeychain isn’t necessary. Dave Dribin’s blog lays it all out: ssh-agent on Mac OS X 10.5 and, for the security conscious, Securing ssh-agent on Mac OS X 10.5.

A couple of things to watch out for:

  • If you are switching from SSHKeychain, remove the environment override for SSH_AUTH_SOCK from ~/.MacOSX/environment.plist.
  • To get the GUI passphrase dialog and the option to save the passphrase in your keychain, you must use the system ssh, not one from Fink or MacPorts.
CakePHP Quick Start Guide for Experts
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Steve Madsen
CakePHP Quick Start Guide for Experts

I’ve started a new project and, to my disappointment, the hosting environment won’t support Ruby. It is the client’s own facility, so using another provider is not an option.

I looked at the web frameworks page at Wikipedia and picked out six for a deeper look: Akelos, CakePHP, CodeIgniter, Kohana, Symfony and Zend. My major requirements were:

  • PHP (<= 5.1)
  • MVC
  • ORM
  • Test framework
  • Some support for database migration
  • Caching
  • Maturity: stable code and a healthy community

In a nutshell, something approximating Rails. I settled on CakePHP. Much of what makes Rails great can be traced directly back to Ruby, and you can’t approach that level of expressiveness in PHP, so an approximation is the best we can do.

Coming up to speed on a new framework is always a stop-and-go affair, but Matt Curry’s Super Awesome Advanced CakePHP Tips (free PDF e-book) is terrific. Highly recommended if you already know what you’re doing and just need answers to “how do I… in CakePHP?”

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