Bug#662736: ITP: maxwell -- entropy-gathering daemon

["Pedro I. Sanchez" <pirivan.sanchez@gmail.com>]

Package: wnpp
Followup-For: Bug #662736
Owner: "Pedro I. Sanchez" <psanchez@fosstel.com>

Package: wnpp
Followup-For: Bug #662736
Owner: "Pedro I. Sanchez" <psanchez@fosstel.com>

Package: wnpp
Followup-For: Bug #662736
Owner: "Pedro I. Sanchez" <psanchez@fosstel.com>

Package: wnpp
Severity: wishlist

* Package name         : maxwell
  Version              : 1.2-1
  Upstream Author      : Sandy Harris <sandyinchina@gmail.com>
* URL                  : ftp://ftp.cs.sjtu.edu.cn:990/sandy/maxwell/
* License              : GPL v2
  Programming Language : C
* Description          : entropy-gathering daemon

Daemon to gather entropy from a timer and feed it to random(4).

maxwell collects randomness from the small variations in a system
timer, distills it into a concentrated form, and sends it to random (4).

The amount of output varies with the parameters chosen, but is
generally a few K bits per second. The quality is intended to be very high.
Both volume and quality should be adequate for most applications.

There are a number of other ways to feed entropy to random (4).
The advantage of maxwell is that it is small, simple and only minimally
hardware-dependent. The other methods also have advantages, and in many
cases one of them will be preferable to this one.


The package can be found on mentors.debian.net:

	http://mentors.debian.net/package/maxwell

This is an inital release.

TODO:

* Package to consider the fact that maxwell is a daemon.
* Create binaries for accompanying test programs.