Date: Mon, 18 Mar 1996 17:44:15 +1100 From: Bruce Evans <bde@zeta.org.au> To: current@freebsd.org, mark@grondar.za Subject: Re: /dev/random - an idea/proposal Message-ID: <199603180644.RAA10248@godzilla.zeta.org.au>
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>I am not completely happy with my current method of selecting the >interrupts for /dev/random right now. (There is rndcontrol(8) with >some command-line switches, and sysconfig has a line to edit). It >is too easy to overlook, and I am very keen that /dev/random be seen >to provide a decent source of entropy. Neither am I, for the opposite reasons :-). The default sysconfig setting of rand_irqs is almost useless except to print an annoying message to announce rndcontrol (add_keyboard_randomness() calls add_timer_randomness() a nearly constant number of usec before add_interrupt_randomness() for the keyboard interrupt calls add_timer_randomness()). >I would like some way to be able to choose these at kernel build >time - ie at the time the system manager configures her kernel, >she nominates that a particular device's interrupts should be used. >This I would like to do by adding a keyword "random", syntactically >similar to "conflicts" to the config(8) grammar. This will then set This would be far too much trouble. As well as hacking config, you would have to: - fix the problems that stop "conflicts" from working for PCI and EISA devices - update userconfig and dset to support the new flag A kernel option to set a bitmap of the interrupts used to generate randomness would be easier to implement, but it would be easier to overlook than rndcontrol(8). Bruce
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