Shining my tptacek light re: Applied Cryptography http://news.ycombinator.com/it...

stcredzero · on Feb 4, 2011

I actually read Applied Cryptography when it first came out. My experience is that it convinced me that crypto is hard to do right not that it's easy.

"Practical" will be my next technical read.

tptacek · on Feb 5, 2011

It came out in, like, 1995 didn't it? I remember that because all my IRC friends immediately got to work on crazy crypto tools with algorithms and ideas cadged from that book. It definitely didn't teach them that crypto was hard.

stcredzero · on Feb 6, 2011

It came out in, like, 1995 didn't it?

That would be about right.

I remember that because all my IRC friends immediately got to work on crazy crypto tools with algorithms and ideas cadged from that book. It definitely didn't teach them that crypto was hard.

It's one thing to do some fun project. It's another thing to do something for production. It's yet another thing to read such a book and realize it means there's people who know a lot more about this than you. At the same time, it is a fun read for a techie.