Nick's JSSE and OpenSSL notes


These pages contain some information I've come across while trying to get OpenSSL and JSSE talking to each other, and some example code.


Example programs

The examples here show how you can code SSL clients/servers using both JSSE and the OpenSSL API. You can use either client to talk to either server.

The Java programs require JDK1.4, and so have only been tested on Microsoft Windows.

The OpenSSL programs have been tested on OpenVMS and Tru64 UNIX.

The programs are the result of a fair amount of of trial and error which ended up with something that appears to work, so it's possible they have mistakes in them, or aren't doing things "the right way".


Using SSL with LDAP (the StartTls extension)

LdapTlsExample.java is an example program which communicates with a suitable LDAP server and negotiates SSL using the StartTLS extension which was made available in JDK1.4


Gotchas

It took a while to get the example programs running; here's some of the information that I wished I'd had before I started.


Utilities

Home-grown utilities that helped me work out what was going on.


Handy links


[nickoh] [java]