Daniel Quinlan writes: > I think you mean "instead of DES". It's the crypt(3) function that > would be changed to use MD5 (MD5a).
Yes, wasn't thinking straight obviously. > I think switching would probably be a decent idea, although it is not > of earth-shattering importance to me. I'm also concerned about doing > Debian doing it alone, instead of with the cooperation of the rest of > the Linux community. Though it would be nice if the whole community switched I don't think it's that great a deal whether they do or not, us using MD5 and others using DES shouldn't lead to any incompatibilties or problems as far as I can see. > I am more interested in longer user names and longer password. I'm > disgusted with being limited to eight characters. Yes, MD5 obviously makes the system that much more secure from attempts at using crack on a passwd file. MD5 being much slower than DES and also just the fact that you can't count on the password being 8 characters long anymore would make it a quite a more difficult process. Andrew -- Dehydration - 34%, Recollection of previous evening - 2%, embarrassment factor - 91%. Advise repair schedule:- off line for 36 hours, re-boot startup disk, and replace head - wow, what a night! -- Kryten in Red Dwarf `The Last Day' Andrew Howell [EMAIL PROTECTED] Perth, Western Australia [EMAIL PROTECTED]