[crypto] OpenSC seems to break GnuPG?

So, I’ve been trying to get a SCM SPR532 working yesterday, but that didn’t really want to play nice. Today, I wanted to use my trusty old SCM SCR335 again, but GnuPG kept giving me sharing violations like so:

$ gpg -d secretdocument.gpg
gpg: detected reader `SCM SCR 335 00 00'
gpg: pcsc_connect failed: sharing violation (0x8010000b)
gpg: kaartlezer is niet beschikbaar

(The last line read “card reader not available” in Dutch.)

Very annoying. I tried shooting down the running pcscd, but that didn’t help. Then, I uninstalled OpenSC, which seemed to have helped. No idea why, but honestly, the documentation is so very vague, I hardly know how all these components work together.

Anyway, I hope it helps someone.

Tags: crypto, encryption, error, gnupg, opensc, pcscd, scm, scr335, spr532, troubleshooting

[crypto] Not getting SCM SPR532 working on MacOSX Leopard

Anyone out there that got the pinpad of the SCM SPR532 working for gnupg? I’ve followed a lot of advice from the OpenSC project, but I’m unable to get it to work. Didn’t try it with any other service, since I’m only interested in the GnuPG application to support my smartcard for the time being. Any advice is really appreciated.

Tags: crypto, encryption, gnupg, leopard, macosx, opensc, smartcard, spr532

Stuff

I might have blogged about this before, but I really like the way the message is presented. People who know me, know I’m fairly “green”-minded. That’s because simply, I think we’re going the wrong way and need to double back. That doesn’t mean cut back on everything we like (for example, my iMac is on 24×7, just for my convenience), but does require us to make the right choices (my screensaver turns off my screen, I pay for renewable energy only). And sometimes the best option isn’t viable (I’d so want to buy a good, electric car like the Mitsubishi iMIEV, but it’s probably way out of my budget), but then we take the best next one (a small, cleaner car like the Suzuki Alto, which serves my needs and uses way less gas then most other cars in that price range).

Anyway, the link I wanted to post: The Story of Stuff

Enjoy!

Tags: car, environment, green, stuff

[FunkLoad] Random tests for benchmarking

I’ve recently started using FunkLoad to do benchmarking of websites. It works quite okay and I love the fact that it’s Python, since that’s my language of choice.

One thing that kept bugging me was that since FunkLoad is more a unittester, it can by default only run a single run multiple times against a site. That won’t do. You want several different kinds of users visiting your website when you’re benchmarking. But since everything is Python, I was able to solve that like this:

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# -*- coding: iso-8859-15 -*-
"""loadtest FunkLoad test
 
$Id: $
"""
import unittest, random, sys
from funkload.FunkLoadTestCase import FunkLoadTestCase
from webunit.utility import Upload
from funkload.utils import Data
#from funkload.utils import xmlrpc_get_credential
 
class LoadTest(FunkLoadTestCase):
    """ Loadtest for website.
 
    This test use a configuration file LoadTest.conf.
    """
 
    def setUp(self):
        """Setting up test."""
        self.logd("setUp")
        self.server_url = self.conf_get('main', 'url')
 
    def doTest(self):
        # Picks a test at random
        tests = ["8081","8082","8083","8084","8085","8086"]
        rnd = random.choice(tests)
        return getattr(self, "test_"+str(rnd))()
 
    def test_8081(self):
        # The description should be set in the configuration file
        server_url = self.server_url
        # begin of test ---------------------------------------------
        # end of test---------------------------------------------
 
    def test_8082(self):
        # The description should be set in the configuration file
        server_url = self.server_url
        # begin of test ---------------------------------------------
        # end of test---------------------------------------------

(I left out the test themselves, but I’m sure you can find where to place them.)

The recorded tests are in the same class, and they’re called test_8081, test_8082, etc. up to test_8086. These corresponded to the proxy ports on which fl-record was listening when the session was recorded. Line 27 makes sure that the test that was chosen gets run.

You can of course expand this as much as you like, for example adding weights for certain tests. Kinda neat, python.

Tags: benchmarking, funkload, python, random, website, work