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--></style></head><body bgcolor=white lang=EN-US link="#0563C1" vlink="#954F72"><div class=WordSection1><pre style='margin-left:.5in'>IMHO this interface is a way for the user to improve the quality of the randomness it would get from the given RNG, <span class=moz-txt-tag><b>*</b></span><b>not<span class=moz-txt-tag>*</span></b> to replace (or diminish) its other sources. My proposal is to abolish this parameter, especially since now it is simply ignored (and IMHO – for a good reason).<o:p></o:p></pre><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-left:.5in'><br>That's a fine proposal ... it just can't be implemented until a major release boundary, when our ABI stability policy permits such breaking changes.<br><br><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>And that is fine. The sooner the better, but ABI stability makes sense too. <o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>My main point is: <span style='font-family:"Courier",serif'>RAND_add()</span> and whatever similar in purpose interface calls we may define in the future should exhibit the following behavior:<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><ol style='margin-top:0in' start=1 type=a><li class=MsoListParagraph style='margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'>Mix the provided randomness into the RNG state *<b>immediately</b>*, and<o:p></o:p></li><li class=MsoListParagraph style='margin-left:0in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'>Keep pulling other sources and mixing them into the state – don’t subtract from the “needed entropy” count the amount you presumably got from the user.<br><br><o:p></o:p></li></ol><p class=MsoNormal>Frankly, the need to provide <span style='font-family:"Courier",serif'>double entropy</span> argument doesn’t bother me all that much – especially if the value 0 is accepted there. ;-)<o:p></o:p></p></div></body></html>