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pylsl Integration

Using the security-enabled Python binding.

Overview

pylsl is the Python binding for Lab Streaming Layer. The security-enabled version ships as a component of this repository at apps/pylsl/ and adds:

  • automatic preference for liblsl-secure when it is present
  • library-level version queries (base, security, and full version strings)
  • per-stream security status, so an application can tell whether a discovered stream is encrypted

It remains under its upstream MIT license, including the security additions.

Install

pip install -e apps/pylsl

The binding locates liblsl-secure automatically when it is installed. To point at a specific build, set PYLSL_LIB:

export PYLSL_LIB=/path/to/secureLSL/liblsl/build/liblsl-secure.so

Checking the build

import pylsl

pylsl.is_secure_build()   # True when linked against liblsl-secure
pylsl.base_version()      # underlying liblsl version
pylsl.security_version()  # security layer version
pylsl.full_version()      # combined version string

check_security() combines the test with a warning, which is convenient at application start-up:

pylsl.check_security()  # warns if not linked against a secure build

Checking stream security

StreamInfo exposes two methods:

from pylsl import resolve_streams

for info in resolve_streams():
    if info.security_enabled():
        print(f"{info.name()}: encrypted, key {info.security_fingerprint()[:16]}")
    else:
        print(f"{info.name()}: plaintext")

Both are methods rather than properties. security_fingerprint() returns the fingerprint of the public key the stream was authorized under, which lets an application confirm a stream belongs to the expected trust group.

Behavior on a stock liblsl

The security symbols are resolved defensively at import time. Linked against a stock liblsl that does not export them, the binding imports and behaves exactly as upstream, and the security properties report that the information is unavailable rather than raising.

This means the same application code runs against both libraries, which is what makes the drop-in library replacement work without application changes.

See also