Sponsoring The Perl Toolchain Summit 2025: Help make this important event another success Learn more

NAME

Authen::TacacsPlus - Perl extension for authentication using tacacs+ server

SYNOPSIS

$tac = new Authen::TacacsPlus(Host=>$server,
Key=>$key,
Port=>'tacacs',
Timeout=>15);
or
$tac = new Authen::TacacsPlus(
[ Host=>$server1, Key=>$key1, Port=>'tacacs', Timeout=>15 ],
[ Host=>$server2, Key=>$key2, Port=>'tacacs', Timeout=>15 ],
[ Host=>$server3, Key=>$key3, Port=>'tacacs', Timeout=>15 ],
... );
$tac->authen($username,$passwords);
Authen::TacacsPlus::errmsg();
$tac->close();

DESCRIPTION

Authen::TacacsPlus allows you to authenticate using tacacs+ server.

$tac = new Authen::TacacsPlus(Host=>$server,
Key=>$key,
Port=>'tacacs',
Timeout=>15);

Opens new session with tacacs+ server on host $server, encrypted with key $key. Undefined object is returned if something wrong (check errmsg()).

With a list of servers the order is relevant. It checks the availability of the Tacacs+ service using the order you defined.

Authen::TacacsPlus::errmsg();

Returns last error message.

$tac->authen($username,$password,$authen_type);

Tries an authentication with $username and $password. 1 is returned if authenticaton succeded and 0 if failed (check errmsg() for reason).

$authen_type is an optional argument that specifies what type of authentication to perform. Allowable options are: Authen::TacacsPlus::TAC_PLUS_AUTHEN_TYPE_ASCII (default) Authen::TacacsPlus::TAC_PLUS_AUTHEN_TYPE_PAP Authen::TacacsPlus::TAC_PLUS_AUTHEN_TYPE_CHAP

ASCII uses Tacacs+ version 0, and will authenticate against the "login" or "global" password on the Tacacs+ server. If no authen_type is specified, it defaults to this type of authentication.

PAP uses Tacacs+ version 1, and will authenticate against the "pap" or "global" password on the Tacacs+ server.

CHAP uses Tacacs+ version 1, and will authenticate against the "chap" or "global" password on the Tacacs+ server. With CHAP, the password if formed by the concatenation of chap id + chap challenge + chap response

There is example code in test.pl

If you use a list of servers you can continue using $tac->authen if one of them goes down or become unreachable.

$tac->close();

Closes session with tacacs+ server.

EXAMPLE

$tac = new Authen::TacacsPlus(Host=>'foo.bar.ru',Key=>'9999');
unless ($tac){
print "Error: ",Authen::TacacsPlus::errmsg(),"\n";
exit(1);
}
if ($tac->authen('john','johnpass')){
print "Granted\n";
} else {
print "Denied: ",Authen::TacacsPlus::errmsg(),"\n";
}
$tac->close();

AUTHOR

Mike Shoyher, msh@corbina.net, msh@apache.lexa.ru

Mike McCauley, mikem@airspayce.com

BUGS

only authentication is supported

only one session may be active (you have to close one session before opening another one)

SEE ALSO

perl(1).