Messages in this thread |  | | From | Bradley Ward Allen <> | Subject | Re: unusual startup messages | Date | 01 Nov 1996 06:30:36 -0500 |
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> You've raised an interesting point: once Linus moses to the US, we won't > be able to integrate cryptography into the "standard" kernel if Linux is > maintained from the U.S. instead of Finland.
Well, it seems crypto has to be in the kernel. Like there's IP security for both IPv4 *and* IPv6, and obviously that's part of the kernel, and it's expected to be ubiquitous at some stage.
My opinion for what it counts (mostly how much noise I make :) ) is to have Linus include it before he leaves Finland, creating lots of hooks, etc. so that if/when he moves to some other place others can distribute designated drop-in patch sets that fit cleanly with the kernel and are considered a part of it despite the distribution (i.e. law abiding & broken-up package) realities. Actually making them work with something isn't so important in my mind until they're needed (as the goal in this case is to get around a legal hurdle).
So which algorithms? Well, there's DES (& 3DES), IDEA, BlowFish, MD5, RSA, ... heck include them all, refine later. :) Or define the hooks for the drop-ins now. Or something like that.
Lots of packages need cryptography. Perhaps a library? But how would the kernel efficiently interface with a library? Is that insane? Is POSIX working on a library interface? (Like for every IP packet. This has to be *efficient*.) Also, lots of applications use it (email (PGP, Netscape Mail (1Q 1997), SSH, telnet-SSL, httpd w/SSL). See? It's at every level.
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