[local] Report on Portland Cpunks meeting

[Alan Olsen]

At 02:40 PM 1/23/96 -0500, Weld Pond wrote:
>
>>There was a key signing.  It was a bit rough as for many of us it was our
>>first key signing.  (I think Neal was the only person who had been to an
>>organized key signing.)  Still, it went fairly well.  Only a couple of
>>people brought their key fingerprints on disk instead of paper.  As of
>>today, I have only recieved signed keys back from a couple of people
>>though...  The next key signing will be done a bit differently.  (Live and
>>learn.)  There was also a suggestion for a nym signing at some point.
>
>This begs the question, "How would you conduct an efficient key signing 
>given what you have learned?" I am in the process of organizing one and 
>would like to get input as to the best way that this should take place.  
>Should people bring key fingerprints and public keys on floppy?  Would it 
>be nice to be online and grab public keys off of a key server? How would 
>you conduct a nym signing?

The things that I learned was that instructions should be sent to the
participants well in advance.  

Key fingerprints should be brought on paper becuase it is not always assured
of having a computer there to read the disk. (We had a lap top that was
refusing to read disks effectivly.  We had to use on of the Habit's
computers.)  
Distributing the keys on disk worked well.  (I also brought PGP and various
tools for those who did not have them.) With the key server there is still
an issue of verifying that the key is valid.  Best to have the key
fingerprint on paper, where it can be read to the group.

We also found that reading the first half of the fingerprint was more than
attiquite and saved a great deal of time.  (Which was later wasted on
getting keys off of disks.)

I will also be distributing batch files for those dos users who are not
familiar with how to sign keys and creating extra keyrings.

Most of the problems were procedural rather than technical.

It went well for a first run...
Alan Olsen -- alano at teleport.com -- Contract Web Design & Instruction
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       "Is the operating system half NT or half full?"