Subject: Compatibility testing goals and planning

From: John W Noerenberg II <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 19:50:49 -0600

Earlier this month I proposed an interoperability testing meeting for 
OpenPGP.  A number of people have responded they are interested in 
participating, and I've given some more thought to what we want to 
accomplish.  Rod Thayer and I had the opportunity to discuss it 
further today, and a plan is beginning to take shape.

The OpenPGP Oven-Cooking Competition (in deference to a local 
Minneapolis company who feels another name impinges their reputation) 
is intended to test compliance with 2440 in a variety of scenarios. 
I'll provide a compliance matrix for the 2440 requirements that 
implementers can use as a guide.  The matrix will be reviewed both by 
Rod and by Jon Callas to make sure I haven't missed anything 
important, or misstated anything.  And, of course, it will be 
published to this list as soon as possible for your review.  Uses of 
OpenPGP we anticipate testing are PGP/MIME, TLS over OpenPGP, and 
IPSec over OpenPGP.  We'll verify interoperation of key generation, 
signing and verification.  We're considering ways to verify key 
server interoperability.  However, there are no published protocols 
for this.  So I'm not sure what we can accomplish in this area.  We'd 
like to test implementations of the AES algorithms, as well as the 
mandated algorithms in 2440.   Execution speed isn't nearly as 
important as correct execution of the protocols and underlying 
algorithms. But bear in mind that I don't expect the meeting to last 
more than 2 days. <grin>

Rod will create a more detailed test plan which we'll publish for 
comments on the list.  I'd like to aim at holding the Oven-Cooking 
Competition sometime during June or July so that we can publish our 
status on 2440 in time for the London meeting.  Some people have 
indicated they won't be able to participate in person, so one of the 
things I'll arrange is a means for people to also test remotely. 
However, I want to emphasize how valuable face-to-face meetings are 
for interoperability testing.  We'll be able to solve problems 
interactively, and discover issues that otherwise may take a long 
time to surface.

These are my general goals for the meeting.  Please comment and offer 
suggestions.  That's the best way to insure this little confab serves 
your needs as implementers and users of OpenPGP.

-- 

john noerenberg
[email-masked]
   --------------------------------------------------------------------------
   Peace of mind isn't at all superficial, really.  It's the whole thing.
   That which produces it is good maintenance; that which disturbs it
   is poor maintenance.
   -- Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert M. Pirsig, 1974
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---

From: Robert Guerra <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2001 01:23:17 -0500

John , Rodney & JON :

I think this a wonderfull idea whose time has come.

I'm involved in agreat deal of PGP training to english and non-english 
audiences and am particularly interested in how different implementations 
handle non USA ASCII text. If this aspect of testing might be of interest, 
please do let me know..as more than happy to help

Regards,

Robert
ps.

--On Monday, March 19, 2001 7:50 PM -0600 John W Noerenberg II 
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> accomplish.  Rod Thayer and I had the opportunity to discuss it further
> today, and a plan is beginning to take shape.
>
> The OpenPGP Oven-Cooking Competition (in deference to a local Minneapolis
> company who feels another name impinges their reputation) is intended to
> test compliance with 2440 in a variety of scenarios. I'll provide a
> compliance matrix for the 2440 requirements that implementers can use as
> a guide.  The matrix will be reviewed both by Rod and by Jon Callas to
> make sure I haven't missed anything important, or misstated anything.
> And, of course, it will be published to this list as soon as possible for
> your review.  Uses of OpenPGP we anticipate testing are PGP/MIME, TLS
> over OpenPGP, and IPSec over OpenPGP.  We'll verify interoperation of key
> generation, signing and verification.  We're considering ways to verify
> key server interoperability.  However, there are no published protocols
> mandated algorithms in 2440.   Execution speed isn't nearly as important
> as correct execution of the protocols and underlying algorithms. But bear
> in mind that I don't expect the meeting to last more than 2 days. <grin>
>
> things I'll arrange is a means for people to also test remotely. However,
> I want to emphasize how valuable face-to-face meetings are for
> interoperability testing.  We'll be able to solve problems interactively,
> and discover issues that otherwise may take a long time to surface.
>

Robert Guerra <[email-masked]>
WWW: http://www.geocities.com/rguerra/