[Zope3-dev] RFC: Rename "principal" to "participant"

[Marc Rijken]

Stephan Richter wrote:
> On Monday 12 September 2005 12:31, Philipp von Weitershausen wrote:
> 
>>So, I would like to give "principal" a better name. How about
>>"participant"? After all, a principal _participates_ in an interaction
>>through a participation (e.g. an HTTP request). Participant should also
>>be pretty easy to translate: it's a common word, especially outside IT
>>vocubulary, which means chances are good to find appropriate native
>>translations for it.
> 
> 
> This is not true. A group is also a principal, but a group does not 
> participate in an interaction.
> 
> BTW, I think Jim took those terms from established security patterns.
> 
> Regards,
> Stephan

 From an end user point of view, the use of "principal" can be confusing. But for 
developers, it is common to use "principal". For example both in .NET and Java, 
principal is being used as term for "user". See for example:

http://www.gotdotnet.com/team/clr/about_security.aspx

and

http://www.samspublishing.com/articles/article.asp?p=28496&rl=1

Marc