Setting the API key as a global environment variable is probably not so safe

[rikhuijzer]

Setting a global environment variable is okayish if you are in a protected environment such as a Docker image on a protected server, but probably not so great when it's a global variable available to the whole user system. Maybe a configuration file or starting Julia in a separate shell with the environment variable set would be better.

[ThatcherC]

Thanks! I definitely see the value in keeping the API key somewhere other than an environment variable. Do you think Preferences.jl would be an appropriate solution? I haven't used it before but it looks like it's intended for this kind of thing. I'll give it a go.

[rikhuijzer]

Yes or a config file would also help a bit.

The best would probably be allow users to obscure their key like https://rclone.org/commands/rclone_obscure/, but I haven't seen people do that in Julia packages yet so I don't know how

[ThatcherC]

The Preferences.jl approach in #4 went pretty well! I do like the idea of obscuring the keys, but I haven't come across a good way to do that yet so I think I'll save that feature for a future PR.

[diegozea]

Using https://github.com/JuliaCrypto/Nettle.jl to encrypt the API key could be an excellent option.

[rikhuijzer]

Using https://github.com/JuliaCrypto/Nettle.jl to encrypt the API key could be an excellent option.

But where do you leave the key in a open source repository? Still, encrypting it with some key is better than nothing, I guess.

[diegozea]

Sorry, I do not fully follow. Why would one store the encrypted API key in an open-source repo rather than in their system?

[rikhuijzer]

Sorry, I do not fully follow. Why would one store the encrypted API key in an open-source repo rather than in their system?

The idea of encryption is that only people who have the key can read the information. The problem is: Where would ReplGPT.jl leave the key? Everybody can read the source code of ReplGPT.jl. Maybe, on second thought, it is better to not encrypt because then at least a leak can be detected like happened in #8.

[diegozea]

I see! I was imagining using a password per user to encrypt the key.