Start process, hide arguments from ps
php, python, security
Solution
You could use environment variables which you set in PHP and read in the Python script.
Problem
I have a Python script that interfaces with an API. The script is started from a PHP page. I wrote both scripts, so I can change the code in either as appropriate. The Python script needs a username and password to interface with the API. My first inclination is to pass them to Python as CLI arguments: ``` <?php exec('python someScript.py AzureDiamond hunter2'); ?> ``` However, anybody can then see the credentials via `ps`: ``` $ ps | grep someScript 1000 23295 2.0 0.2 116852 9252 pts/0 S+ 15:47 0:00 python someScript.py AzureDiamond hunter2 ``` Alternatives that I am considering are to write the data to a text file or sqlite database, then to delete them. Are there any better ideas? A constraint with the sqlite approach is that this needs to run in a rather portable fashion (phpFox Plugin) and most budget webhosts don't support the `sqlite3` module.