From owner-freebsd-doc Sun Jul 7 14: 1: 5 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-doc@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.FreeBSD.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 78B2837B400; Sun, 7 Jul 2002 14:01:03 -0700 (PDT) Received: from 12-234-90-219.client.attbi.com (12-234-90-219.client.attbi.com [12.234.90.219]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1BC5043E3B; Sun, 7 Jul 2002 14:01:03 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from DougB@FreeBSD.org) Received: from FreeBSD.org (master.gorean.org [10.0.0.2]) by 12-234-90-219.client.attbi.com (8.12.3/8.12.3) with ESMTP id g67L0vBu087727; Sun, 7 Jul 2002 14:01:02 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from DougB@FreeBSD.org) Message-ID: <3D28AC09.9AD48DF4@FreeBSD.org> Date: Sun, 07 Jul 2002 14:00:57 -0700 From: Doug Barton Organization: Triborough Bridge & Tunnel Authority X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.79 [en] (X11; U; FreeBSD 4.5-RELEASE i386) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: doc@FreeBSD.org, markm@FreeBSD.org Subject: Another project: rndcontrol Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-doc@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.org [ cc'ing Mark out of the blue in case he has anything to add. :] Folks, I have another project suggestion if anyone is interested. BIND 9 requires that you have a fairly good supply of randomness available on the system to do its work (which is actually a good thing) but one problem our RELENG_4 users run into often is that without rand_irqs set in their rc.conf[.local] they don't have enough. I could write up something for the bind-users FAQ, but it would probably be nice if we had a handbook/FAQ entry for the project that described this... something else to drive traffic to the site. :) An outline that covers what I would need is something to this effect: 1. Brief description of what a pseudo-random number generator (PRNG) is, and why it's needed. 2. Difference in RELENG_4 between /dev/random and /dev/urandom. a. /dev/random == fairly good quality random bits, IF it's properly seeded. b. /dev/urandom always guaranteed to return "something" 3. What is rndcontrol? 4. How do I choose my irq's? a. grep -i irq /var/run/dmesg.boot b. Pick things like disks and ethernet that have "random" activity 5. How do I set this up in /etc/rc.conf (rand_irqs). 6. In FreeBSD 5, we have yarrow instead. a. link to Mark's paper on this b. harvest_* already set to YES in /etc/defaults/rc.conf c. /dev/random and /dev/urandom are now the same. If anyone wants to take this on, please let me know... otherwise I'll have to write it up myself, since the question comes up often on the bind lists. Thanks, Doug -- "We have known freedom's price. We have shown freedom's power. And in this great conflict, ... we will see freedom's victory." - George W. Bush, President of the United States State of the Union, January 28, 2002 Do YOU Yahoo!? To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-doc" in the body of the message