COMP 404 Fall 2014	Communications Assignment 6: Balancing Flexibility and Extensibility Against Security

Question:  

The more flexible and extensible one makes a system, the more different things one can do with it.   This can lead to tremendous capabilities including the ability for the system to evolve into future, unpredicted uses.  But the flip side to all this power and capability is that it also opens the door for potential abuse of the system both in terms of using its operations for damaging or illegal purposes but also in terms of allowing any stored to be accessed and/or used for improper purposes.

Discuss the pros and cons of different techniques that you either know about or can imagine for balancing the needs of flexibility and extensibility against the needs for security in the system.   Use at least distinct 3 examples.

The goal here is NOT for you to present the "correct" answer (you'd be very rich right now if you actually had the answer) but to look at different approaches from different angles to assess their strengths, weaknesses and appropriateness in different situations.

Be sure to consider the following ideas and issues:

•  What criteria are used for determining the level of flexibility and/or extensibility that is allowed?
• Under what circumstances is it reasonable to compromise or reduce the level of imposed security?
• When discussing options for creating the appropriate balance of flexibility and extensibility vs. security for a given appliation, consider the relative strenghts and weaknesses of inheritance-based (whitebox frameworks) vs. composition-based (blackbox framework) systems.  
  • In particular, examine the relative security of delegating to a service provided by one's own superclass vs. a service provided by an externally-sourced entity.

Be sure to follow the General Communications Guidelines when writing your discussions!

© 2014 by Stephen Wong