From: aba@atlas.ex.ac.uk
Date: Mon, 18 Dec 1995 20:15:09 +0800
To: rick@muskoka.net
Subject: Re: BIO-MUNITION: gifs of perl-RSA tattoo
In-Reply-To: <Pine.BSD/.3.91.951217221057.9112A-100000@segwun.muskoka.net>
Message-ID: <14204.9512181148@exe.dcs.exeter.ac.uk>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Richard Sheffar <rick@net.muskoka> writes on cpunks:
> Okay, I admit it I don't know everything.
> What does the perl script actually do.

It does RSA encrypt/decrypt, works with keys up to 1024 bits (and
larger).

> I saved to file, chmod 777 perly
> tried running the script and kept getting error line 3.

You need two utils installed on your machine: perl and dc.  Not having
dc would cause an error on line 3.  Try getting gnu dc (bc-1.03.tar.gz
from gnu sites, see:

	http://www.dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/rsa/dc.html
)

> What does it do, does it encrypt a file or what. What Have i done wrong?

To encrypt:

	rsa -k=11 -n=ca1 < plaintext > ciphertext
	
to decrypt:

	rsa -d -k=ac1 -n=ca1 < ciphertext > out

you can extract pgp keys to use with it, that was a 32 bit key for
demonstrational purposes and offers no security.  See:

	http://www.dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/rsa/pgpacket.html

for extracting pgp keys in hex format.

Adam