1 .\" $NetBSD: RAND_egd.3,v 1.14 2015/06/12 17:01:14 christos Exp $
3 .\" Automatically generated by Pod::Man 2.28 (Pod::Simple 3.28)
6 .\" ========================================================================
7 .de Sp \" Vertical space (when we can't use .PP)
11 .de Vb \" Begin verbatim text
16 .de Ve \" End verbatim text
20 .\" Set up some character translations and predefined strings. \*(-- will
21 .\" give an unbreakable dash, \*(PI will give pi, \*(L" will give a left
22 .\" double quote, and \*(R" will give a right double quote. \*(C+ will
23 .\" give a nicer C++. Capital omega is used to do unbreakable dashes and
24 .\" therefore won't be available. \*(C` and \*(C' expand to `' in nroff,
25 .\" nothing in troff, for use with C<>.
27 .ds C+ C\v'-.1v'\h'-1p'\s-2+\h'-1p'+\s0\v'.1v'\h'-1p'
31 . if (\n(.H=4u)&(1m=24u) .ds -- \(*W\h'-12u'\(*W\h'-12u'-\" diablo 10 pitch
32 . if (\n(.H=4u)&(1m=20u) .ds -- \(*W\h'-12u'\(*W\h'-8u'-\" diablo 12 pitch
47 .\" Escape single quotes in literal strings from groff's Unicode transform.
51 .\" If the F register is turned on, we'll generate index entries on stderr for
52 .\" titles (.TH), headers (.SH), subsections (.SS), items (.Ip), and index
53 .\" entries marked with X<> in POD. Of course, you'll have to process the
54 .\" output yourself in some meaningful fashion.
56 .\" Avoid warning from groff about undefined register 'F'.
60 .if \n(.g .if rF .nr rF 1
61 .if (\n(rF:(\n(.g==0)) \{
64 . tm Index:\\$1\t\\n%\t"\\$2"
74 .\" Accent mark definitions (@(#)ms.acc 1.5 88/02/08 SMI; from UCB 4.2).
75 .\" Fear. Run. Save yourself. No user-serviceable parts.
76 . \" fudge factors for nroff and troff
85 . ds #H ((1u-(\\\\n(.fu%2u))*.13m)
91 . \" simple accents for nroff and troff
101 . ds ' \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*8/10-\*(#H)'\'\h"|\\n:u"
102 . ds ` \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*8/10-\*(#H)'\`\h'|\\n:u'
103 . ds ^ \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*10/11-\*(#H)'^\h'|\\n:u'
104 . ds , \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*8/10)',\h'|\\n:u'
105 . ds ~ \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu-\*(#H-.1m)'~\h'|\\n:u'
106 . ds / \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*8/10-\*(#H)'\z\(sl\h'|\\n:u'
108 . \" troff and (daisy-wheel) nroff accents
109 .ds : \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*8/10-\*(#H+.1m+\*(#F)'\v'-\*(#V'\z.\h'.2m+\*(#F'.\h'|\\n:u'\v'\*(#V'
110 .ds 8 \h'\*(#H'\(*b\h'-\*(#H'
111 .ds o \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu+\w'\(de'u-\*(#H)/2u'\v'-.3n'\*(#[\z\(de\v'.3n'\h'|\\n:u'\*(#]
112 .ds d- \h'\*(#H'\(pd\h'-\w'~'u'\v'-.25m'\f2\(hy\fP\v'.25m'\h'-\*(#H'
113 .ds D- D\\k:\h'-\w'D'u'\v'-.11m'\z\(hy\v'.11m'\h'|\\n:u'
114 .ds th \*(#[\v'.3m'\s+1I\s-1\v'-.3m'\h'-(\w'I'u*2/3)'\s-1o\s+1\*(#]
115 .ds Th \*(#[\s+2I\s-2\h'-\w'I'u*3/5'\v'-.3m'o\v'.3m'\*(#]
116 .ds ae a\h'-(\w'a'u*4/10)'e
117 .ds Ae A\h'-(\w'A'u*4/10)'E
118 . \" corrections for vroff
119 .if v .ds ~ \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*9/10-\*(#H)'\s-2\u~\d\s+2\h'|\\n:u'
120 .if v .ds ^ \\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*10/11-\*(#H)'\v'-.4m'^\v'.4m'\h'|\\n:u'
121 . \" for low resolution devices (crt and lpr)
122 .if \n(.H>23 .if \n(.V>19 \
135 .\" ========================================================================
137 .IX Title "RAND_egd 3"
138 .TH RAND_egd 3 "2009-07-19" "1.0.1n" "OpenSSL"
139 .\" For nroff, turn off justification. Always turn off hyphenation; it makes
140 .\" way too many mistakes in technical documents.
144 RAND_egd \- query entropy gathering daemon
148 .IX Header "SYNOPSIS"
150 \& #include <openssl/rand.h>
152 \& int RAND_egd(const char *path);
153 \& int RAND_egd_bytes(const char *path, int bytes);
155 \& int RAND_query_egd_bytes(const char *path, unsigned char *buf, int bytes);
158 .IX Header "DESCRIPTION"
159 \&\fIRAND_egd()\fR queries the entropy gathering daemon \s-1EGD\s0 on socket \fBpath\fR.
160 It queries 255 bytes and uses \fIRAND_add\fR\|(3) to seed the
161 OpenSSL built-in \s-1PRNG.\s0 RAND_egd(path) is a wrapper for
162 RAND_egd_bytes(path, 255);
164 \&\fIRAND_egd_bytes()\fR queries the entropy gathering daemon \s-1EGD\s0 on socket \fBpath\fR.
165 It queries \fBbytes\fR bytes and uses \fIRAND_add\fR\|(3) to seed the
166 OpenSSL built-in \s-1PRNG.\s0
167 This function is more flexible than \fIRAND_egd()\fR.
168 When only one secret key must
169 be generated, it is not necessary to request the full amount 255 bytes from
170 the \s-1EGD\s0 socket. This can be advantageous, since the amount of entropy
171 that can be retrieved from \s-1EGD\s0 over time is limited.
173 \&\fIRAND_query_egd_bytes()\fR performs the actual query of the \s-1EGD\s0 daemon on socket
174 \&\fBpath\fR. If \fBbuf\fR is given, \fBbytes\fR bytes are queried and written into
175 \&\fBbuf\fR. If \fBbuf\fR is \s-1NULL, \s0\fBbytes\fR bytes are queried and used to seed the
176 OpenSSL built-in \s-1PRNG\s0 using \fIRAND_add\fR\|(3).
179 On systems without /dev/*random devices providing entropy from the kernel,
180 the \s-1EGD\s0 entropy gathering daemon can be used to collect entropy. It provides
181 a socket interface through which entropy can be gathered in chunks up to
182 255 bytes. Several chunks can be queried during one connection.
184 \&\s-1EGD\s0 is available from http://www.lothar.com/tech/crypto/ (\f(CW\*(C`perl
185 Makefile.PL; make; make install\*(C'\fR to install). It is run as \fBegd\fR
186 \&\fIpath\fR, where \fIpath\fR is an absolute path designating a socket. When
187 \&\fIRAND_egd()\fR is called with that path as an argument, it tries to read
188 random bytes that \s-1EGD\s0 has collected. \fIRAND_egd()\fR retrieves entropy from the
189 daemon using the daemon's \*(L"non-blocking read\*(R" command which shall
190 be answered immediately by the daemon without waiting for additional
191 entropy to be collected. The write and read socket operations in the
192 communication are blocking.
194 Alternatively, the EGD-interface compatible daemon \s-1PRNGD\s0 can be used. It is
196 http://prngd.sourceforge.net/ .
197 \&\s-1PRNGD\s0 does employ an internal \s-1PRNG\s0 itself and can therefore never run
200 OpenSSL automatically queries \s-1EGD\s0 when entropy is requested via \fIRAND_bytes()\fR
201 or the status is checked via \fIRAND_status()\fR for the first time, if the socket
202 is located at /var/run/egd\-pool, /dev/egd\-pool or /etc/egd\-pool.
204 .IX Header "RETURN VALUE"
205 \&\fIRAND_egd()\fR and \fIRAND_egd_bytes()\fR return the number of bytes read from the
206 daemon on success, and \-1 if the connection failed or the daemon did not
207 return enough data to fully seed the \s-1PRNG.\s0
209 \&\fIRAND_query_egd_bytes()\fR returns the number of bytes read from the daemon on
210 success, and \-1 if the connection failed. The \s-1PRNG\s0 state is not considered.
212 .IX Header "SEE ALSO"
213 \&\fIopenssl_rand\fR\|(3), \fIRAND_add\fR\|(3),
214 \&\fIRAND_cleanup\fR\|(3)
217 \&\fIRAND_egd()\fR is available since OpenSSL 0.9.5.
219 \&\fIRAND_egd_bytes()\fR is available since OpenSSL 0.9.6.
221 \&\fIRAND_query_egd_bytes()\fR is available since OpenSSL 0.9.7.
223 The automatic query of /var/run/egd\-pool et al was added in OpenSSL 0.9.7.