At 04:13 PM 4/25/03 -0700, Tim May wrote:

Forget worrying about the details of various ciphers in Schneier's book,

Indeed. I entered crypto interested in how ciphers worked. (Avalanche, my boy, avalanche). But all you need to know is what they do, and a few properties of noise. Similarly with PK ciphers. Just know that RSA lets you use insecure channels, and you don't have to be online. DH does same, but requires online-ness. Only a few need actually worry about implementation details. The more sophisticated protocols that use these components --Blind this, Dining that, Split it N ways, Sign here-- are the building blocks that app designers ought to know. Again, one needs to know what's possible with the protocols, not how to do them. [This is not to say that undergrads should not be exposed to them, much as they derive things in school which later they'll merely know exist, and can look up if necessary. Neither is it to denigrate those who study, invent, maybe improve these things.] Got Montgomery multiplication?