I'm working my way through the PBE example PBEWithParamsExample on pp 46-47 of Cryptography with Java. This class seems fubar (which is probably from my mis-understanding).

1. why is the hardcoded 'password' the only value that allows this example to work. It doesn't seem to correspond to any of the byte arrays (which I was guessing might be the connection).
2. Why do you encrypt with pre-calculated keys but decrypt with a key based off a password. It would make more sense to generate a synch key off of a password and then have to know the password to use the same key to decrypt the message. However, I'm sure there is something I'm missing.


Bryan

With 1. the array keyBytes is the precomputed PKCS#12 key that the password, salt, and iteration count in the second half of the example produce.

With 2. it's to demonstrate what PKCS#12 PBE does under the covers - it takes the password, salt and iteration count and an internal key which is the same value as keyBytes.

Regards,

David