[Python-Dev] Controlling the cipher list for SSL connections (original) (raw)

Bill Janssen janssen at parc.com
Thu Sep 10 20:14:51 CEST 2009

Chris,

OK, seems reasonable. Thanks. In the near term, can you do this with M2Crypto or PyOpenSSL?

When I started this update in 2007, we were trying to keep the API simple to avoid confusing people and avoid competition with the two full-fledged toolkits out there. But I don't see any real reason not to extend the API a bit.

Bill

Chris Frantz <frantzcj at gmail.com> wrote:

Bill,

I agree that it's usually better to let the SSL implementation pick the ciphers. I have a certain device that I'd like to talk to that is running on an underpowered embedded CPU. When I let OpenSSL pick the ciphers, it chooses something like EDH-RSA-AES-SHA and takes about 3.5 seconds to finish the handshake. If I can restrict the cipher list to RSA-RC4-SHA I can reduce the handshake time to less than a second and improve the throughput of any bulk data transfer over the connection. --Chris

On Thu, Sep 10, 2009 at 12:09 PM, Bill Janssen<janssen at parc.com> wrote: > Thanks, Chris.  Can you explain why you want to set the cipher list > explicitly?  IMO, it's usually better to select a security scheme (TLS1, > or SSLv3, etc.), and let the implementation pick the cipher list. > > Bill > > Chris Frantz <frantzcj at gmail.com> wrote: > >> Done. >> >> Attached to Issue 3597, which is a similar request to mine. >> >> Best Regards, >> --Chris _>> ________________________ >> Python-Dev mailing list >> Python-Dev at python.org >> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-dev >> Unsubscribe: http://mail.python.org/mailman/options/python-dev/janssen%40parc.com >

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