Pluggable Authentication Module

security (PAM) The new industry standard integrated login

framework. PAM is used by system entry components, such as

the Common Desktop Environment's dtlogin, to authenticate

users logging into a Unix system. It provides pluggability

for a variety of system-entry services. PAM's ability to

stack authentication modules can be used to integrate

login with different authentication mechanisms such as

RSA, DCE and Kerberos, and thus unify login mechanisms.

PAM can also integrate smart card authentication.

White paper .

[OSF-RFC 86.0 V. Samar, R. Schemers, "Unified Login with

Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM)", Oct 1995].

(1997-07-18)