How to encrypt client-side subversion password on a command-line only Ubuntu machine

2
votes

Is there a way to encrypt client-side svn user passwords on a terminal-only Ubuntu machine? (ie. the subversion server is accessible through https).

I've got a hosted svn repository accessible over https. I've also got a VPS running some services. I'm backing up data on the VPS on a regular basis (using cron). This backup is one small gzipped file which changes rarely, I always overwrite the old file with the newest version, so there is always only one file. I would like to store this file in the svn repository and do a commit each time a new backup has been produced. I would like to do this with cron as well, but wouldn't like to store my svn-account's password unencrypted on the VPS in any way. I know there are some easy gnome and KDE solutions, but I haven't got gui. Are there any command-line password-managers which work well with subversion?

Any hints?

1
svnencryption
You could use svn+ssh and use an ssh key for authentication but then the ssh key is just as vulnerable as the password. - Stephen Paulger
Thanks Stephen, I think I have no svn+ssh access to my repository, just https. Apart from that, AFAIK, I would have to be able to generate a ssh key on the server side to do that, which I cannot. - mmm

1 Answers

2
votes

What would the point of storing the crypted password be? Presumably you'd need to decrypt the key within the cron script, which means you'd have to store the decryption key. So instead of storing a plaintext password, you're storing a crypted password and the key to decrypt it.

In real world terms, you'll have an unbreakable bank vault with the access code on a post-it next to the door's keypad.