how safe is Python for CGI?

[sismex01 at hebmex.com]

> From: DG [mailto:david at fielden.com.au]
> 
> Greetings,
> 
> I am thinking about using Python's CGI capabilities to write 
> some simple web front ends to a database.  The web server is
> running apache under Linux, Python 2.2.1.
> 
> How secure is Python for this?  For example, it seems that I 
> will need to put the database path, username and password into
> the database connect() line in the cgi-bin script, is it
> possible for someone to download the script from the cgi-bin
> directory without running it, and then inspect the
> source to find the database path/user/pass?
> 
> What are common Python practices to circumvent this, if it is 
> a problem?
> 
> Are there any other gotchas to this sort of script?
> 
> tia
> 
> Rowdy
>

This is responsability of your Apache installation,
not Python's. You have to mark your cgi-bin directory
as executable, non-browsable, etc etc.

There's other FAQs you can search for which contain
detailed documentation on this subject.

Google is your friend :-)

-gustavo