--- begin forwarded text To: pgplib-announce@cryp.to Subject: PGPlib-0.3 is available Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 11:10:03 +0200 From: Tage Stabell-Kulo <tage@ACM.org> Reply-To: tage@acm.org Sender: pgplib-announce-owner@cryp.to Precedence: list -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- This mail is sent on the list pgplib-announce@cryp.to. It is a (very) low voulme list where announcments are made when new versions of PGPlib becomes available. Please find below a copy of the file README distributed with this new release. Instructions on how to obtain your own copy of PGPlib is included. === Welcome to version 0.3 of PGPlib. This code has not yet matured enough to reach version 1.0. However, this is probably the latest development version before 1.0. Detailed instructions for how to obtain this fine code can be found at the end. Experienced users will know that ftp://dslab1.cs.uit.no/pub/PGPlib.tar.gz is the place to look. What is here for you ===================== PGPlib is a library that lets you generate (and manipulate) PGP packets without having to run PGP. In particular there is code to generate and understand the following types of PGP packets: - Data can be signed with a private key; - Data can be encrypted with a public key; - Data encrypted with your public key can be decrypted; - You can verify signatures on public keys and on buffers (files); - Convential encrypted (IDEA with Zimmermann's context sensitive feedback). The library can both read (decrypt) and write (encrypt) convential packets (in PGP format); - Armor. You can (de)armor a buffer or a file into a buffer or a file; - UserID packets are read and written in a variety of formats; - Literal with filename, mode, etc. You can create literate packages from files, or from buffers, and create files from literate packets; - Keys can be obtained from a database (which is provided) or by parsing keyrings. Keys can be kept in buffers or on files; - You can maintain a PGP public-key database (I use this library to maintain a database with ~40.000 keys). There is code to use DBM as supplied from Berkeley. A copy of DBM is included for your convinience. In general, PGPlib operates on buffers in order for you to use it in your applications. You will find included a small program that will (de)armor anything, a parser to parse PGP files (including decryption and so on), a shell to manipulate a keydatabase, a keyserver to run on top of such a database, a program to verify signatures on keys and/or files, a program to split keyrings in smaller parts and a program that will sign files for you. You will find all these (and more) in the PGPlib/applications/ directory. None of these uses PGP, the library provides all the functionality you need. What is not there for you ========================= - Sufficient documentation. I have written this library because I need it. In order to make life less hard for my students, I will have to provide some documentation. Possibly even on-line. However, quite a few manual pages are included. What you need ============= - Unix (for some definition of "Unix"). - You must have the SSLeay library as I have not implemented any cryptographic functionality; I hope SSLeay is a good choice. I did not major in mathematics and can thus not judge the quality of their work, although it looks solid (to me). I link with their version 0.8.1. I rely on SSLeay for many things, in particular their BIGNUMs, RSA encryption and IDEA. You can obtain your copy of SSLeay from: * ftp://ftp.psy.uq.oz.au/pub/Crypto/SSL/ - SSLeay source * ftp://ftp.psy.uq.oz.au/pub/Crypto/SSLapps/ - SSL applications * http://www.psy.uq.oz.au/~ftp/Crypto/ssl.html - SSLeay Programmer Reference SSLeay is quite large and I only use a fraction of it. other hand, SSLeay seems to be well maintained and their crypto-library might very well shrink or become more modular as time passes. Also, work is in progress to strip out from SSLeay only thise parts that PGPlib uses. Porting ======= PGPlib has been developed on NetBSD 1.2. It should compile smoothly on FreeBSD, HP-UX and Linux. If you port PGPlib to some other platform, I would be greatful if you would send me patches. In particular, PGPlib does not compile on SunOS 4 and 5, your assistance would be valuable. Regarding PGP ============= - Work is underway to ensure that PGPlib is compliant with RFC1991. - The name PGPlib might not be final as I respect Zimmermann's "ownership" of the acronym PGP and he might not like that this library uses the name PGPlib. Thus, this library might become libRFC1991.a or something. - PGP-5.0 is available. It has several new features, such as a multitude of encryption methods. PGPlib might evolve to support them all. Your Feedback ============ Your feedback is solicited. Peter Simons <Peter.Simons@gmd.de> has created a mailinglist for PGPlib. To subscribe, send an e-mail to the address pgplib-dev-request@crypt.to and write the command SUBSCRIBE into the BODY. If you want to be subscribed under a different address than the one you're mailing from, you can also use SUBSCRIBE yourname@somewhere.else to do the trick. To post to the list, send an e-mail to pgplib-dev@cryp.to as usual. There is also (very low volume) list pgplib-announce@cryp.to. Subscribe by sending an e-mail to pgplib-announce-request@cryp.to with SUBSCRIBE in the body. Both lists are archived at URL:http://www.cryp.to/ If you write a nice application based on this library (the ultimate feedback :-), please feel free to send it to me and I will include it in the next release; Where to get PGPlib =================== ftp://dslab1.cs.uit.no/pub/PGPlib.tar.gz This file is a link to the latest version. If you obtain the file PGPlib-0.3.tar.gz instead, note that a name conflict will occur when you unpack the file (see below). What to do ========== First, uncompress PGPlib, which should give you the file PGPlib.tar. When you unpack PGPlib.tar you will get three files in your CURRENT directory. These files are README : This file PGPlib-0.3.tar : The library PGPlib-0.3.tar.sig : My signature on the above. Verify the signature by running pgp PGPlib-0.3.tar.sig and verify that PGP prints Good signature from user "Tage Stabell-Kulo <tage@cs.uit.no>". When you unpack PGPlib-0.3.tar, tar will create the directory PGPlib-0.3 and place all the files within it. Unless you run SunOS, running the script configure should produce Makefiles that you can use to compile everything. To verify that everything compiled correctly, you should run the script applications/test.sh. Before you do so, you must edit away the code that asks you to read this file. COPYRIGHT (yum, yum) ========= The library and included applications are all available under "Berkeley style" copyright terms. Basically, this means that PGPlib is FREE for commercial and non-comercial use, and that you can do almost anything with the code. The only thing you can not do is to say that you wrote it. See the file COPYING for details. //// Tage Stabell-Kuloe | e-mail: tage@ACM.org //// /// Department of Computer Science/IMR | Phone : +47-776-44032 /// // 9037 University of Tromsoe, Norway | Fax : +47-776-44580 // / "'oe' is '\o' in TeX" | URL:http://www.cs.uit.no/~tage/ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3ia Charset: latin1 Comment: Processed by Mailcrypt 3.2, an Emacs/PGP interface iQCVAwUBNAPu4wMzZ6tx+9RpAQEM2AP/Sp7REQHWSRGhscblUpX7CPoin6h9Lo5Y D0CzO/7cm9kqXqB3oQ3xPhchEcXzJEyABz8mehoAm6+D3Bqus1aI1JkcD6mVmoUE yQ3QU0X0jXdN84xcjTn6cyQx3iuu17MQ5/WKoLh2Ftq5DzBGATGlmGN6O6TRUbAW SZrCOQDN54M= =XjX4 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ PGP Library Announcements --- end forwarded text ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' The e$ Home Page: http://www.shipwright.com/