Is ZeroC's ICE under consideration? It seems like it has a lot of the
features people have been discussing, including encryption and compression,
ability to reduce inter-host communication for topics, distributed
registries, and even ROS-like parameters (though they live on each
component rather than on a central parameter server). It has a pretty
similar though more general message format.

--Ben


On Sat, Feb 22, 2014 at 12:16 AM, Geoffrey Biggs
<geoffrey.biggs@aist.go.jp>wrote:

> On 21/02/14 08:45, Brian Gerkey wrote:
> > On Thu, Feb 20, 2014 at 3:26 PM, Aravind Sundaresan
> > <asundaresan@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> We are using ROS in a DARPA program where we need the communication
> between
> >> the master and nodes as well as the messaging to be secure. Is there
> anybody
> >> else who finds this important? Does DDS provide secure communications?
> >
> > You're not alone in wanting secure communications for robotics.  We
> > would be remiss in a major rewrite to completely ignore security
> > (which is not to say that we must implement security mechanisms, but
> > we'd better at least end up with a solid story about our approach to
> > security, with clear guidance to users).
> >
> > As I understand it, there's a proposed extension to the DDS spec,
> > currently under review, to add security.  Here's a relevant
> > presentation:
> >
> > http://www.slideshare.net/GerardoPardo/dds-security-standard
> >
> > But given that DDS is apparently used in so many mission-critical
> > applications, surely there's some encryption happening, perhaps in
> > non-standard vendor-specific ways that vary by implementation?  Or
> > perhaps they're using DDS like we use ROS, where you're expected
> > secure your network.
>
> The answer to this is more along the lines of the original target
> audience of DDS operating private/closed networks. When all your
> communication happens within a single Navy frigate on dedicated
> communication wires, security is less problematic. DDS growing beyond
> its original audience has caused many vendors to start thinking about
> how to do security. A VPN is one option, but obviously many users want
> something a bit lighter weight.
>
> Geoff
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