$PostgreSQL: pgsql/contrib/chkpass/README.chkpass,v 1.3 2005/09/23 15:05:04 tgl Exp $

Chkpass is a password type that is automatically checked and converted upon
entry.  It is stored encrypted.  To compare, simply compare agains a clear
text password and the comparison function will encrypt it before comparing.
It also returns an error if the code determines that the password is easily
crackable.  This is currently a stub that does nothing.

I haven't worried about making this type indexable.  I doubt that anyone
would ever need to sort a file in order of encrypted password.

If you precede the string with a colon, the encryption and checking are
skipped so that you can enter existing passwords into the field.

On output, a colon is prepended.  This makes it possible to dump and reload
passwords without re-encrypting them.  If you want the password (encrypted)
without the colon then use the raw() function.  This allows you to use the
type with things like Apache's Auth_PostgreSQL module.

The encryption uses the standard Unix function crypt(), and so it suffers
from all the usual limitations of that function; notably that only the
first eight characters of a password are considered.

D'Arcy J.M. Cain
darcy@druid.net