eCAP is a software interface that allows a network application,
such as an HTTP proxy or an ICAP server, to outsource content
analysis and adaptation to a loadable module. For each applicable
protocol message being processed, an eCAP-enabled host application
supplies the message details to the adaptation module and gets back
an adapted message, a "not interested" response, or a "block this
message now!" instruction. These exchanges often include message
bodies.
The adaptation module can also exchange meta-information with the
host application to supply additional details such as configuration
options, a reason behind the decision to ignore a message, or a
detected virus name.
If you are familiar with the ICAP protocol (RFC 3507), then you
may think of eCAP as an "embedded ICAP", where network interactions
with an ICAP server are replaced with function calls to an adaptation
module.
The libecap library implements the eCAP API in C++.
