The output from commands is represented as ([Expr],String), where the [Expr] is
used when data is piped between commands and the String is used for the final
output. The String can represent the same list of trees as the [Expr] and/or
contain diagnostic information.
Sometimes the data that is piped between commands is not a list of trees, but
e.g. a string or a list of strings. In those cases, functions like fromStrings
and toStrings are used to encode the data as a [Expr].
This patch introduces a newtype for CommandOutput and collects the functions
dealing with command output in one place to make it clearer what is going on.
It also makes it easier to change to a more direct representation of piped
data, and make pipes more "type safe", if desired.
+ The restrictions on arbitrary IO when GF is running in restricted mode is now
enforced in the types.
+ This hopefully also solves an intermittent problem when accessing the GF
shell through the web API provided by gf -server. This was visible in the
Simple Translation Tool and probably caused by some low-level bug in the
GHC IO libraries.
The dependency on PGFEnv has been moved from the list to the exec function of
the commands in the list. This means that the help command no longer needs
to generate a new list of commands and that the state of the shell
(type GF.Command.Interpreter.CommandEnv) no longer needs to contain the list
of commands.
An apparent bug in ghc-7.2.2 causes the type Value to be exported from PGF.Data.
Workaround: restrict the imports from PGF.Data in GF.Command.Abstract and
GF.Compile.GeneratePMCFG to avoid the clash with locally defined type Value.
(ghc-7.0.4 and ghc-7.4.1 appear to be free from this bug.)
By setting the environment variable GF_RESTRICTED before starting GF, the shell
will be run in restricted mode. This will prevent the GF shell from starting
arbitrary system commands (most uses of System.Cmd.system are blocked) and
writing arbitrary files (most commands that use writeFile et al are blocked).
Restricted mode is intended minimize the potential security risks involved
in allowing public access to the GF shell over the internet. It should be used
in conjuction with system level protection mechanisms (e.g. file permissions)
to make sure that a publicly acessible GF shell does not give access to parts
of the system that should not be publicly accessible.
