README

   1
   2  OpenSSL 0.9.2b 22 Mar 1999
   3
   4  Copyright (c) 1998-1999 The OpenSSL Project
   5  Copyright (c) 1995-1998 Eric A. Young, Tim J. Hudson
   6  All rights reserved.
   7
   8  DESCRIPTION
   9  -----------
  10
  11  The OpenSSL Project is a collaborative effort to develop a robust,
  12  commercial-grade, fully featured, and Open Source toolkit implementing the
  13  Secure Sockets Layer (SSL v2/v3) and Transport Layer Security (TLS v1)
  14  protocols with full-strength cryptography world-wide. The project is managed
  15  by a worldwide community of volunteers that use the Internet to communicate,
  16  plan, and develop the OpenSSL tookit and its related documentation.
  17
  18  OpenSSL is based on the excellent SSLeay library developed from Eric A. Young
  19  and Tim J. Hudson.  The OpenSSL toolkit is licensed under a dual-license (the
  20  OpenSSL license plus the SSLeay license) situation, which basically means
  21  that you are free to get and use it for commercial and non-commercial
  22  purposes as long as you fullfill the conditions of both licenses.
  23
  24  OVERVIEW
  25  --------
  26
  27  The OpenSSL toolkit includes:
  28
  29  libssl.a:
  30      Implementation of SSLv2, SSLv3, TLSv1 and the required code to support
  31      both SSLv2, SSLv3 and TLSv1 in the one server and client.
  32
  33  libcrypto.a:
  34      General encryption and X.509 v1/v3 stuff needed by SSL/TLS but not
  35      actually logically part of it. It includes routines for the following:
  36
  37      Ciphers
  38         libdes - EAY's libdes DES encryption package which has been floating
  39                  around the net for a few years.  It includes 15
  40                  'modes/variations' of DES (1, 2 and 3 key versions of ecb,
  41                  cbc, cfb and ofb; pcbc and a more general form of cfb and
  42                  ofb) including desx in cbc mode, a fast crypt(3), and
  43                  routines to read passwords from the keyboard.
  44         RC4 encryption,
  45         RC2 encryption      - 4 different modes, ecb, cbc, cfb and ofb.
  46         Blowfish encryption - 4 different modes, ecb, cbc, cfb and ofb.
  47         IDEA encryption     - 4 different modes, ecb, cbc, cfb and ofb.
  48
  49      Digests
  50         MD5 and MD2 message digest algorithms, fast implementations,
  51         SHA (SHA-0) and SHA-1 message digest algorithms,
  52         MDC2 message digest. A DES based hash that is polular on smart cards.
  53
  54      Public Key
  55         RSA encryption/decryption/generation.
  56             There is no limit on the number of bits.
  57         DSA encryption/decryption/generation.
  58             There is no limit on the number of bits.
  59         Diffie-Hellman key-exchange/key generation.
  60             There is no limit on the number of bits.
  61
  62      X.509v3 certificates
  63         X509 encoding/decoding into/from binary ASN1 and a PEM
  64              based ascii-binary encoding which supports encryption with a
  65              private key.  Program to generate RSA and DSA certificate
  66              requests and to generate RSA and DSA certificates.
  67
  68      Systems
  69         The normal digital envelope routines and base64 encoding.  Higher
  70         level access to ciphers and digests by name.  New ciphers can be
  71         loaded at run time.  The BIO io system which is a simple non-blocking
  72         IO abstraction.  Current methods supported are file descriptors,
  73         sockets, socket accept, socket connect, memory buffer, buffering, SSL
  74         client/server, file pointer, encryption, digest, non-blocking testing
  75         and null.
  76
  77      Data structures
  78         A dynamically growing hashing system
  79         A simple stack.
  80         A Configuration loader that uses a format similar to MS .ini files.
  81
  82  openssl:
  83      A command line tool which provides the following functions:
  84
  85      enc     - a general encryption program that can encrypt/decrypt using
  86                one of 17 different cipher/mode combinations.  The
  87                input/output can also be converted to/from base64
  88                ascii encoding.
  89      dgst    - a generate message digesting program that will generate
  90                message digests for any of md2, md5, sha (sha-0 or sha-1)
  91                or mdc2.
  92      asn1parse - parse and display the structure of an asn1 encoded
  93                binary file.
  94      rsa     - Manipulate RSA private keys.
  95      dsa     - Manipulate DSA private keys.
  96      dh      - Manipulate Diffie-Hellman parameter files.
  97      dsaparam- Manipulate and generate DSA parameter files.
  98      crl     - Manipulate certificate revocation lists.
  99      crt2pkcs7- Generate a pkcs7 object containing a crl and a certificate.
 100      x509    - Manipulate x509 certificates, self-sign certificates.
 101      req     - Manipulate PKCS#10 certificate requests and also
 102                generate certificate requests.
 103      genrsa  - Generates an arbitrary sized RSA private key.
 104      gendsa  - Generates DSA parameters.
 105      gendh   - Generates a set of Diffie-Hellman parameters, the prime
 106                will be a strong prime.
 107      ca      - Create certificates from PKCS#10 certificate requests.
 108                This program also maintains a database of certificates
 109                issued.
 110      verify  - Check x509 certificate signatures.
 111      speed   - Benchmark OpenSSL's ciphers.
 112      s_server- A test SSL server.
 113      s_client- A test SSL client.
 114      s_time  - Benchmark SSL performance of SSL server programs.
 115      errstr  - Convert from OpenSSL hex error codes to a readable form.
 116      nseq    - Netscape certificate sequence utility
 117
 118  PATENTS
 119  -------
 120
 121  Various companies hold various patents for various algorithms in various
 122  locations around the world. YOU are responsible for ensuring that your use of
 123  any algorithms is legel by checking if there are any patents in your country.
 124  The file contains some of the patents that we know about or are rumoured to
 125  exist. This is not a definitive list.
 126
 127  RSA Data Security holds software patents on the RSA and RC5 algorithms.  If
 128  their ciphers are used used inside the USA (and Japan?), you must contact RSA
 129  Data Security for licencing conditions. Their web page is
 130  http://www.rsa.com/.
 131
 132  RC4 is a trademark of RSA Data Security, so use of this label should perhaps
 133  only be used with RSA Data Security's permission.
 134
 135  The IDEA algorithm is patented by Ascom in Austria, France, Germany, Italy,
 136  Japan, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK and the USA.  They should
 137  be contacted if that algorithm is to be used, their web page is
 138  http://www.ascom.ch/.
 139
 140  INSTALLATION
 141  ------------
 142
 143  To install this package under a Unix derivative, read the INSTALL file.  For
 144  a Win32 platform, read the INSTALL.W32 file.
 145
 146  For people in the USA, it is possible to compile OpenSSL to use RSA Inc.'s
 147  public key library, RSAref. Read doc/ssleay.txt under 'rsaref.doc' on how to
 148  build with RSAref.
 149
 150  Read the documentation in the doc/ directory.  It is quite rough, but it
 151  lists the functions, you will probably have to look at the code to work out
 152  how to used them. Look at the example programs.
 153
 154  SUPPORT
 155  -------
 156
 157  If you have any problems with OpenSSL then please take the following steps
 158  first:
 159
 160     - Remove ASM versions of libraries
 161     - Remove compiler optimisation flags
 162     - Add compiler debug flags (if using gcc then remove -fomit-frame-pointer
 163       before you try to debug things)
 164
 165  If you wish to report a bug then please include the following information in
 166  any bug report:
 167
 168     OpenSSL Details
 169     - Version, most of these details can be got from the
 170       'openssl version -a' command.
 171     Operating System Details
 172     - OS Name
 173     - OS Version
 174     - Hardware platform
 175     Compiler Details
 176     - Name
 177     - Version
 178     Application Details
 179     - Name
 180     - Version
 181     Problem Description
 182     - include steps that will reproduce the problem (if known)
 183     Stack Traceback (if the application dumps core)
 184
 185  Report the bug to the OpenSSL project at:
 186
 187     openssl-users@openssl.org
 188