[cap-talk] "ambient authority" on wiki.erights.org

[John Carlson]

On Jun 11, 2009, at 3:26 PM, Mark Miller wrote:

>
>
> On Thu, Jun 11, 2009 at 3:11 PM, Karp, Alan H <alan.karp at hp.com>  
> wrote:
> I don't think any of the definitions I've seen so far capture what  
> to me is the essential nature of ambient authority, the separation  
> of designation from authorization.  I think the following captures  
> that point.
>
> "A system in which the submitter of a request does not specify which  
> permissions to apply to the request is said to use ambient  
> authorities."
>
> I like that too!
>
> I'd change to "...which of its permissions to apply...".
>
>
> I'm not sure if "does not" should be "need not" or "must not."
>
> Hmmm. I'm not sure either. I think I like "does not" best, but I'm  
> not sure I can say why.


So in the math world, this would be:

Ambient Authority:  The mathematician need not specify the operator or  
operands in an expression which has an operator and operands.  The  
mathematician may evaluate the expression and get a response without  
knowledge of the operator or the operands.

Designated Authority:   Before the mathematician may apply an  
operator, the mathematician must have an operator and an associated  
operand (designated as a symbol together) granted to the  
mathematician.  Other operands are optional, and may be applied at the  
time the expression is evaluated.

Now I'll step out on a limb:

In the ambient authority world, anything may be an operator or an  
operand.   They are indistinguishable.  In the designated authority  
world, things have  been given meaning (permission to apply an  
operator to an operand). 
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