/dev/random

Corinna Vinschen corinna@vinschen.de
Wed May 24 00:50:00 GMT 2000


Daniel Probst wrote:
> 
> The cygwin implementation seems to be based on the MS Crypto API. Is this
> right?
> Well this is certainly better than no /dev/random, but I do feel uneasy
> about using it for crypto purposes.
> Why didn't one choose another entropy generator? Was it purely time/priority
> considerations? How about the Bruce Shneier (Counterplane) open-source
> YARROW module.
> -dan

The MS Crypto API provides the entropy generation by no
extra cost. Why not using already existing APIs? As far
as you can't _prove_ that the MS entropy generator doesn't
pass Chi^2 or similar tests, I'm not willing to implement
code which is already provided by the system.

Or shall I assume that you're feeling uneasy only because
the API is provided by MS?


Here (as always) the following is valid:

	Patches are gratefully accepted.

-- 
Corinna Vinschen
Cygwin Developer
Cygnus Solutions, a Red Hat company

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