BS2000 file passwords

BS2000 files and library elements may be protected by read, write, and execute passwords. In order to access protected files and library elements the required passwords need to be provided.

Providing file passwords

File passwords can be provided for BS2000 files and library elements by the context menu action BS2000 File Passwords > Provide File Passwords.... This will open a password prompt dialog.

File password prompt dialog

The input fields for those passwords defined for that file are enabled, others are disabled. If you only like to read a file, you need not provide write and execute passwords, even if they are defined for the file. Similarly, if you do not want to execute a file, you need not provide an execute password. However, if only a read password is defined, you must provide it for any kind of access to that file (e.g. deletion, overwriting, modifying attributes).

A file password may either be entered as character string (c-string) of up to 4 characters, as hex string (x-string) of up to 8 hex digits, or as an integer of up to 4 digits. Hex strings must be at least one and up to 8 hex digits (0-9, A-F).

The following shows a sample file password prompt dialog for a file having a read and a write password but no execute password. Only the read password is provided.

After having provided the required file passwords, double-clicking on a protected text file will open an appropriate text editor as usual. Note, thereby the file will be transferred from the BS2000 system to your client and cached there. If you prefer to delete the cache at the end of a session you could do this by pressing Clear Cache in Window > Preferences > BS2000 Remote IDE > Cache

Provided passwords are valid for the current session. By default they are also persistently saved in a secure password store to be reused in subsequent sessions. If you don't want to persistently save the passwords, remove the tick from the check box before pressing OK. This will also cause passwords previously stored for this file to be removed from the store.

File passwords view

Files for which passwords have been persistently stored are listed in the BS2000 File Passwords view. In this view you can remove passwords from the persistence store, or change them. Select a password entry and open the context menu (right mouse click). Selecting Change password opens the file password prompt dialog. Remove Stored Passwords removes the selected password from the persistent store (but keeps it locally during the session). The context menu item Remove Stored Passwords is also available for other nodes than password nodes (e.g. file nodes or user ID nodes) and will remove all stored file passwords in the subtree rooted in the selected node.

The following shows a sample BS2000 File Passwords view:

Defining file passwords

File passwords for BS2000 files and library elements can be defined by the following context menu actions: Similarly, if a password has already been defined it can be modified or removed by These actions will open password dialogs. Here is a sample dialog for defining a read password:

To be able to define or modify passwords of a file or library element, you need to provide its current write password, if defined, or otherwise its read password, if defined.

If you just wished to remove an existing password you would tick Remove password and press OK.

If you wish to define a new file password or to modify an existing one you must enter the new password and confirm it. The new password will then be defined for the BS2000 file or library element. It will also be provided for accesses during the current session.

If you tick Persistently save the password it will also be saved in the secure store to be automatically provided in subsequent sessions.