Re: random device?

[Rian Hunter]

On Sun, 2004-07-18 at 14:59, Marco Gerards wrote:
> Rian Hunter <hurd@thelaststop.net> writes:
> 
> > I want to run ssh, so i can run cvs but i need a random device. I found
> > that Marcus wrote a random device translator, but I can't find out where
> > it is. My real question is why isn't a random device translator part of
> > the hurd source tree?
> 
> There needs to be an entropy device in Mach before a random device can
> be added, AFAIK.

well for ultimate random numbers an entropy device would be needed. but
you can emulate one (to an okay degree) with egd (entropy gathering
daemon). actually i found an implementation that uses egd:
http://ibofobi.dk/stuff/hurd-entropy. I think a user-space solution
would be more preferable in the long-run anyway. The L4 kernel has
user-space interrupts, so an even better user-space entropy gatherer
could be written when the Hurd is running under L4, someday.
-rian