From: Mike Rosing <cryptech@Mars.mcs.com>
Date: Tue, 12 Sep 95 19:19:34 PDT
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: generating hash.curve in eliptic.src
Message-ID: <Pine.3.89.9509122121.A19360-0100000@Mars.mcs.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Among other comments, it was pointed out that I had not included 
"hash.curve".  To generate this file I did the following

main()
{
	POINT	point;
	CURVE	curve;

	init_opt_math();
	init_rand();
	rand_curv_pnt(point,curve);
	save_curve("hash.curve",curve,point);
	close_rand();
}

This was done during development and I forgot about it.  A simpler patch 
is to fix an error finding the file with a call to rand_curv_pnt to 
generate it.

Kind of interesting that way for hashing your secret key.  If everyone 
uses a different curve to generate their secret key, access to the 
machine is necessary to even begin to think about cracking any pass phrase.
Don't know if actually adds any security, but it is an interesting concept.

As for why I didn't put up a tar file, no particular reason.  It's source 
for a particular machine (MachTen on a Mac) and I figured every C 
compiler is different so some hacking will be required by anyone interested.
Once more bugs are fixed such as the one above, I'll put it up in a more
easily compilable form.

And thanks for the comments so far.  I'll do my best to keep up with them.

Patience, persistence, truth,
Dr. mike