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Date:      Mon, 23 Oct 2000 20:43:36 -0400
From:      "John W. De Boskey" <jwd@FreeBSD.org>
To:        Warner Losh <imp@village.org>
Cc:        arch@FreeBSD.org
Subject:   Re: cvs commit: src/etc rc
Message-ID:  <20001023204336.A46026@bsdwins.com>
In-Reply-To: <200010232357.RAA11628@harmony.village.org>; from imp@village.org on Mon, Oct 23, 2000 at 05:57:10PM -0600
References:  <20001023195335.A45719@bsdwins.com> <imp@village.org> <10649.972343418@winston.osd.bsdi.com> <20001023195335.A45719@bsdwins.com> <200010232357.RAA11628@harmony.village.org>

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If you want the entropy to be saved into swap, it seems
like we should add this type of functionality to rndcontrol.

rndcontrol -w /dev/da0s1b    # write entropy to end of partition
rndcontrol -r /dev/da0s1b    # attempt to read entropy from partition

I also think we need to clean up the line(s) between the requirments
for crypto strength randomness and normal randomness. 

* mkstemps() & friends don't really need crypto strength (or am
  I missing something.

* mfs requires randomness for the FSIRAND code. If crypto strength
  is not available, will regular randomness do?

Comments welcome.

-John

----- Warner Losh's Original Message -----
> [[ moved to arch ]]
> 
> In message <20001023195335.A45719@bsdwins.com> "John W. De Boskey" writes:
> :   However, the idea(s) in general are good. To take his ideas
> : in a slightly different direction, What about reading data from
> : the kernel from random locations?
> 
> Bootstrapping problems.  You can't pick good random numbers until you
> have a good random state.  Since many many people run GENERIC, you
> can't expect things to be too random.  Before I did the mergemaster
> upgrade, I would always get "A cons is an object with feelings"
> fortune every single first login after reboot....
>
> The diskless workstations are an interesting problem because the
> current scheme of writing to / exposes the random state to the entire
> network....
> 
> Warner


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