From owner-freebsd-stable Fri Mar 3 9: 5:48 2000 Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from speedy.rtfm.com (speedy.rtfm.com [216.98.239.228]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 2110337B635 for ; Fri, 3 Mar 2000 09:05:35 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from ekr@romeo.rtfm.com) Received: from romeo.rtfm.com (romeo.rtfm.com [216.98.239.227]) by speedy.rtfm.com (8.9.1/8.6.4) with ESMTP id JAA26344; Fri, 3 Mar 2000 09:06:57 -0800 (PST) Received: from romeo.rtfm.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by romeo.rtfm.com (8.9.3/8.6.4) with ESMTP id JAA37304; Fri, 3 Mar 2000 09:07:19 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <200003031707.JAA37304@romeo.rtfm.com> To: Kuzak Cc: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Password Length In-reply-to: Your message of "Fri, 03 Mar 2000 08:49:16 PST." <200003031700.e23H0Wp41410@alpha.dgweb.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 (generated by tm-edit 7.108) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Date: Fri, 03 Mar 2000 09:07:19 -0800 From: Eric Rescorla Sender: owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG > >Passwords are ASCII, so the total number of 8-byte 8^8=2^64. > > > >It should be obvious by inspection that 8^8 << 73! > >Incidentally, the number of atoms in a glass of water > >is on the order of 10^25 >> 8^8. > I see it more like this... > > 64^8... Assume 64 possible characters to choose from... > > for the first char in the passwd you have 64 choices, > for the second char in the passwd you have 64 choices, > and so on 8 times.. > > So by the multiplication principal you will have a total > of 64*64*64*64*64*64*64*64 or 64^8 possible permutations > which is >> than 8^8 Though much less than 73! Correct. I was totally on crack when I wrote 8^8. What I meant was (2^8)^8 == 256^8 == 2^64. Nevertheless, 256 > 10^3, thus 256^8 < (10^3)^8 Since (10^3^8) = 10^24, 10^25 >> 2^64. I stand by the rest of my message. -Ekr To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message