On Sat, 2002-08-17 at 23:05, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> This is particularly true on things like embedded routers, where the
> machine usually doesn't actually _run_ much user-level software, but is
> just shuffling packets back and forth. Your logic seems to make it not add
> any entropy from those packets, which can be _deadly_ if then the router
> is also used for occasionally generating some random numbers for other
> things.
Agreed. Further, embedded routers - since they are headless/diskless -
have problems even with the _current_ /dev/random code. They simply do
not generate enough entropy to fulfill sshd requests [1].
Saying "use /dev/urandom" in this case means we may as well not have a
/dev/random. There is a difference between incorrect accounting (which
it seems you have identified) and just too strict gathering behavior.
Robert Love
[1] this is why I wrote my netdev-random patches. some machines just
have to take the entropy from the network card... there is nothing
else.
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Aug 23 2002 - 22:00:14 EST