Mailing List Archive

Remi Guyomarch <rguyom@mail.dotcom.fr> writes:

> With this (a bit large) patch, encrypting to only RSA v3 pubkeys,
> signing with RSA v3 seckeys or symmetric encrypting with --rfc1991
> selects a slightly different output format which is compatible with
> PGP 2.6.3i and PGP 5.0i.

Thanks for all the work you did but I'm sorry to say, that I can't
apply it:

1. For such a long patch the FSF needs a disclaimer - If you can do
so - fine. And I'd really like to see more people with a FSF
"clearance" - I know thta this is sometimes problematic if your
employer wnat sign his part.

2. I don't like the idea of temporary files. It makes the program
more complicated and one goal of GnuPG is to avoid such things.

3. I will (and can't) not add any support for the patented algorithm
IDEA - there is no need for it.

4. Most of the patches are intended for better PGP 2
interoperability. If you need this - use PGP 2 or ask Michael to
add a fallback mechanism to pgpgpg. PGP 2 should be replaced by
more modern programs and therefore I don't think that it is a
good idea to do too much work to help old PGP 2 users.

5. There is a standard called OpenPGP which is defined in RFC 2440
and if PGP >= 5 has problems with this standard it is simply
NAIs duty to fix this. We can't worlk around all the bugs in
PGP5. I'm willing to add what's really needed (ala
--force-v3-sigs) but not everything. It would make the standard
senseless.

> DSA/ElGamal key pair are probably still using PGP 2.x, for example to
> use the type 1 remailer network (which is still heavly based on PGP
> 2.x format).

So they have to stick with PGP 2 or change the remailers.

> PGP 2.6.3i and PGP 5.0i needs an exact byte count in nearly all

This is correct for pgp 2. PGP 5.0 is quite old and has a couple of
bugs. We are not going to work around them.

> packets (encrypted data packet, compressed packet, litteral data
> packet), so GPG needs to use temp files to compute those
> lengths.

It would but rfc2440 allows partial length headers and newer version
of pgp know hoe to handle them.

> Additionaly, I've found that PGP 2.6.3i and 5.0i put the signature
> packet *before* the litteral data packet in an encrypted and signed

Yes. And this is a Bad Thing. GnuPG knows hoe to verify them but
won't create them. A wrapper program can handle this.

> I also added textmode support in the symmetric encrypting code and in
> the store code (this is not related to PGP 2.x compatibility, but it
> doesn't hurt :-).

Okay. I apply this.

I hope you won't give up hacking and testing GnuPG even if I have
rejected your changes.


Werner

--
Werner Koch at guug.de www.gnupg.org keyid 621CC013