Dear Saint dws,

I am but a lowly monk and I am wondering if my particular
solution to this problem resembles any of those you have outlined.

Whenever I need to access a password in a script I pull the password
out of the database itself. This of course assumes the database
is itself secure. I use ssh (F-secure) to call a (bash/SQL*plus) script
that reside on the database server.
updated
This script returns the passwords my scripts needs to use.

I guess what I am asking is, does my script constitute a middle-tier process
you mentioned in your post?

Please bestow some wisdom upon me :)