RE: USB device attached via RS232 adaptor
> From: Dotan Cohen [mailto:dotancohen@gmail.com]
> Sent: Thursday, April 22, 2010 8:42 AM
>
> Here is the device:
> http://img339.imageshack.us/img339/9641/seriall.jpg
>
> It is a real serial device, no USB.
I don't know a lot about smart cards, but as far as I know, you need software to communicate with them over a serial connection. There are Debian packages for some things, like PAM modules for authenticating a user with a smart card. It will communicate over the existing /dev/ttyS* device nodes. Those device nodes will exist for each serial port present on the computer, regardless of whether or not something is plugged into them.
There's also the opensc package, from the opensc-project.org website. Here's the package description:
OpenSC provides a set of libraries and utilities to access smart
cards. It mainly focuses on cards that support cryptographic
operations. It facilitates their use in security applications such as
mail encryption, authentication, and digital signature. OpenSC
implements the PKCS#11 API. Applications supporting this API, such as
Iceweasel and Icedove, can use it. OpenSC implements the PKCS#15
standard and aims to be compatible with all software that does so as
well.
Before purchasing any cards, please read carefully documentation in
/usr/share/doc/opensc/html/wiki/index.html - only some cards are
supported. Not only does card type matters, but also card version,
card OS version and preloaded applet. Only a subset of possible
operations may be supported for your card. Card initialization may
require third party proprietary software.
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