[E-Lang] Irreversible delegation, was: draft statement of consensus

[Mark S. Miller]

At 10:16 AM Thursday 2/8/01, Jonathan S. Shapiro wrote:
>hal@finney.org wrote:
>> The question is one of irrevocable delegation.  If Bob has a capability
>> to access [the Power] in certain ways, can he transfer it to [Mallet] in such a
>> way that he is guaranteed not to be able to interfere with it in the
>> future.
>
>This is completely doable in a pure capability system.
>
>The real issue here is not whether the authority can be transferred
>without interference, nor whether the authority is irrevocable, but
>rather what we mean by "the authority". That is, this is a problem of
>authentication.

Just to be clear, this "The real issue" also has nothing to do with the 
impossibility pointed out by Ralph and summarized at 
http://www.erights.org/elib/capability/conspire.html#revokability .  


>Here is how to solve the problem:

What problem?


>Bob transfers an alleged capability to Alice, [...]

Now I'm totally confused.  Don't you mean Hal's "Carol" (ie, my "Mallet")?  
Hal's "Alice" is the capability (my "Power"), and my "Alice" is the object 
that gave Bob the Power.


        Cheers,
        --MarkM