3 .\" Manual for the administration protocol
5 .\" (c) 2008 Straylight/Edgeware
8 .\"----- Licensing notice ---------------------------------------------------
10 .\" This file is part of Trivial IP Encryption (TrIPE).
12 .\" TrIPE is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
13 .\" the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free
14 .\" Software Foundation; either version 3 of the License, or (at your
15 .\" option) any later version.
17 .\" TrIPE is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
18 .\" ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or
19 .\" FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License
22 .\" You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
23 .\" along with TrIPE. If not, see <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
25 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
26 .so ../common/defs.man \" @@@PRE@@@
28 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
29 .TH tripe-admin 5tripe "18 February 2001" "Straylight/Edgeware" "TrIPE: Trivial IP Encryption"
31 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
34 tripe-admin \- administrator commands for TrIPE
36 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
39 This manual page describes the administration interface provided by the
45 program can be used either interactively or in scripts to communicate
46 with the server using this interface. Alternatively, simple custom
47 clients can be written in scripting languages such as Perl, Python or
48 Tcl, or more advanced clients such as GUI monitors can be written in C
49 with little difficulty.
51 Administration commands use a textual protocol. Each client command or
52 server response consists of a line of ASCII text terminated by a single
53 linefeed character. No command may be longer than 255 characters.
54 .SS "General structure"
55 Each command or response line consists of a sequence of
56 whitespace-separated tokens. The number and nature of whitespace
57 characters separating two tokens in a client command is not significant;
58 the server always uses a single space character. The first token in a
61 identifying the type of command or response contained. Keywords in
62 client commands are not case-sensitive; the server always uses uppercase
65 In order to allow tokens to contain internal whitespace, a quoting
66 mechanism is provided. Whitespace within matched pairs of quotes \(en
71 \(en is considered to be internal. Any character (other than newline)
72 may be escaped by preceding it with a backslash
74 in particular, this can be used to include quote characters. It is
75 impossible for a token to contain a newline character.
77 On output, the server will use double quotes when necessary.
79 For simple client command, the server responds with zero or more
81 lines, followed by either an
87 provides information requested in the command. An
89 response contains no further data. A
91 code is followed by a machine-readable explanation of why the command
94 Simple command processing is strictly synchronous: the server reads a
95 command, processes it, and responds, before reading the next command.
96 All commands can be run as simple commands. Long-running commands
101 block the client until they finish, but the rest of the server continues
103 .B "Background commands"
104 to find out how to issue long-running commands without blocking.
105 .SS "Asynchronous broadcasts"
106 There are three types of asynchronous broadcast messages which aren't
107 associated with any particular command. Clients can select which
108 broadcast messages they're interested in using the
114 message contains a machine-readable message warning of an error
115 encountered while processing a command, unexpected or unusual behaviour
116 by a peer, or a possible attack by an adversary. Under normal
117 conditions, the server shouldn't emit any warnings.
121 message contains a human-readable tracing message containing diagnostic
122 information. Trace messages are controlled using the
124 command-line option to the server, or the
126 administration command (see below). Support for tracing can be disabled
127 when the package is being configured, and may not be available in your
132 message is a machine-readable notification about some routine but
133 interesting event such as creation or destruction of peers.
134 .SS "Background commands"
139 take a long time to complete. To prevent these long-running commands
140 from tying up a server connection, they can be run in the background.
141 Not all commands can be run like this: the ones that can provide a
143 option, which must be supplied with a
146 A command may fail before it starts running in the background. In this
147 case, the server emits a
149 response, as usual. To indicate that a command has started running in
150 the background, the server emits a response of the form
151 .BI "BGDETACH " tag \fR,
154 is the value passed to the
156 option. From this point on, the server is ready to process more
157 commands and reply to them.
159 Responses to background commands are indicated by a line beginning with
165 followed by the command tag. These correspond to the
170 responses for simple commands:
172 indicates information from a background command which has not completed
177 indicates that a background command succeeded or failed, respectively.
179 A background command will never issue an
183 response: it will always detach and then issue any
188 .SS "Client-provided services"
189 .\"* 25 Service-related messages
190 An administration client can provide services to other clients.
191 Services are given names and versions. A client can attempt to
193 a particular service by issuing the
195 command. This may fail, for example, if some other client already
196 provides the same or later version of the service.
198 Other clients can issue
199 .I "service commands"
202 command; the service provider is expected to handle these commands and
205 There are three important asynchronous messages which will be sent to
208 .BI "SVCCANCEL " jobid
209 The named job has been cancelled, either because the issuing client has
210 disconnected or explicitly cancelled the job using the
214 .BI "SVCCLAIM " service " " version
215 Another client has claimed a later version of the named
217 The recipient is no longer the provider of this service.
219 .BI "SVCJOB " jobid " " service " " command " " args \fR...
220 Announces the arrival of a new job. The
222 is a simple token consisting of alphanumeric characters which
224 uses to identify this job.
226 The service provider can reply to the job using the commands
231 The first of these sends an
233 response and leaves the job active; the other two send an
237 response respectively, and mark the job as being complete.
241 is a potentially long-running command, it can be run in the background.
242 This detail is hidden from service providers:
244 will issue the corresponding
246 responses when appropriate.)
247 .SS "Network addresses"
248 A network address is a sequence of tokens. The first is a token
249 identifying the network address family. The length of an address and
250 the meanings of the subsequent tokens depend on the address family.
251 Address family tokens are not case-sensitive on input; on output, they
252 are always in upper-case.
254 At present, only one address family is understood.
256 .BI "INET " address " \fR[" port \fR]
257 An Internet socket, naming an IPv4 address and UDP port. On output, the
258 address is always in numeric dotted-quad form, and the port is given as
259 a plain number. On input, DNS hostnames and symbolic port names are
260 permitted; if omitted, the default port 4070 is used. Name resolution
261 does not block the main server, but will block the requesting client,
262 unless the command is run in the background.
264 If, on input, no recognized address family token is found, the following
265 tokens are assumed to represent an
267 address. Addresses output by the server always have an address family
269 .SS "Key-value output"
274 produce output in the form of
276 pairs, one per token. Neither the
282 Commands which enable or disable kinds of output (e.g.,
286 work in similar ways. They take a single optional argument, which
287 consists of a string of letters selecting message types, optionally
292 to disable, the subsequently listed types.
294 If the argument is omitted, the available message types are displayed,
297 line, in a fixed-column format. Column zero contains the key letter for
298 selecting that message type; column one contains either a space or a
300 sign, if the message type is disabled or enabled respectively; and a
301 textual description of the message type begins at column 3 and continues
302 to the end of the line.
304 Lowercase key letters control individual message types. Uppercase key
305 letters control collections of message types.
307 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
308 .SH "COMMAND REFERENCE"
311 The commands provided are:
313 .BI "ADD \fR[" options "\fR] " peer " " address "\fR..."
314 Adds a new peer. The peer is given the name
316 the peer's public key is assumed to be in the file
318 (or whatever alternative file was specified in the
320 option on the command line). The
322 is the network address (see above for the format) at which the peer can
323 be contacted. The following options are recognized.
327 .BI "\-background " tag
328 Run the command in the background, using the given
332 Don't send an immediate challenge to the peer; instead, wait until it
333 sends us something before responding.
335 .BI "\-keepalive " time
336 Send a no-op packet if we've not sent a packet to the peer in the last
338 interval. This is useful for persuading port-translating firewalls to
339 believe that the `connection' is still active. The
341 is expressed as a nonnegative integer followed optionally by
347 for days, hours, minutes, or seconds respectively; if no suffix is
348 given, seconds are assumed.
353 to authenticate the peer. The default is to use the key tagged
357 The peer is a mobile device, and is likely to change address rapidly.
358 If a packet arrives from an unknown address, the server's usual response
359 is to log a warning and discard it. If the server knows of any mobile
360 peers, however, it will attempt to decrypt the packet using their keys,
361 and if one succeeds, the server will update its idea of the peer's
369 to authenticate to the peer. The default is to use the key named in the
371 command-line option, or a key with type
379 .BI "\-tunnel " tunnel
380 Use the named tunnel driver, rather than the default.
387 line reporting the IP address and port number stored for
390 .BI "ALGS \fR[" peer \fR]
391 Emits information about the cryptographic algorithms in use, in
394 is given, then describe the algorithms used in the association with that
395 peer; otherwise describe the default algorithms.
398 The keys are as follows.
401 Type of key-exchange group in use, currently either
406 .B kx-group-order-bits
407 Length of the group order, in bits. This gives an approximate measure
408 of the group strength.
411 Length of a group element, in bits. This may be useful when analyzing
415 The hash function in use, e.g.,
419 The mask-generating function in use, e.g.,
423 The size of the hash function's output, in octets.
426 The name of the bulk-crypto transform.
429 The amount of overhead, in bytes, caused by the crypto transform.
432 The name of the bulk data cipher in use, e.g.,
436 The length of key used by the bulk data cipher, in octets.
439 The block size of the bulk data cipher, or zero if it's not based on a
443 The maximum amount of data to be encrypted using a single key. (A new
444 key exchange is instigated well before the limit is reached, in order to
445 allow for a seamless changeover of keys.)
448 The message authentication algorithm in use, e.g.,
452 The length of the key used by the message authentication algorithm, in
456 The length of the message authentication tag, in octets.
459 The block cipher in use, e.g.,
463 The length of key used by the block cipher, in octets.
466 The block size of the block cipher.
468 The various sizes are useful, for example, when computing the MTU for a
471 is the MTU of the path to the peer, then the tunnel MTU should be
477 allowing 20 bytes of IP header, 8 bytes of UDP header, a packet type
478 octet, and the bulk-crypto transform overhead (which includes the
483 Cancels the background job with the named
486 .BI "CHECKCHAL " challenge
487 Verifies a challenge as being one earlier issued by
489 and not previously either passed to
491 or in a greeting message.
494 Causes the server to disassociate itself from its terminal and become a
495 background task. This only works once. A notification is issued.
497 .BI "EPING \fR[" options "\fR] " peer
498 Sends an encrypted ping to the peer, and expects an encrypted response.
499 This checks that the peer is running (and not being impersonated), and
500 that it can encrypt and decrypt packets correctly. Options and
501 responses are the same as for the
506 Requests the server to begin a new key exchange with
511 Requests a challenge. The challenge is returned in an
513 line, as a base64-encoded string. See
516 .BI "GREET " peer " " challenge
517 Sends a greeting packet containing the
519 (base-64 encoded) to the named
521 The expectation is that this will cause the peer to recognize us and
522 begin a key-exchange.
525 Causes the server to emit an
527 line for each command it supports. Each line lists the command name,
528 followed by the names of the arguments. This may be helpful as a memory
529 aid for interactive use, or for program clients probing for features.
534 line containing the name of the network interface used to collect IP
535 packets which are to be encrypted and sent to
537 Used by configuration scripts so that they can set up routing tables
538 appropriately after adding new peers.
543 line giving the tag for each outstanding background job.
546 Causes the server to forget all about
548 All keys are destroyed, and no more packets are sent. No notification
549 is sent to the peer: if it's important that the peer be notified, you
550 must think of a way to do that yourself.
553 For each currently-known peer, an
555 line is written containing the peer's name, as given to
558 .BI "NOTIFY " tokens\fR...
561 notification to all interested administration clients.
564 Returns information about a peer, in key-value form. The following keys
569 The tunnel driver used for this peer.
572 The keepalive interval, in seconds, or zero if no keepalives are to be
576 The (short) key tag being used for the peer, as passed to the
581 The full key tag of the peer's public key currently being used. This
582 may change during the life of the association.
585 The private key tag being used for the peer, as passed to the
589 command-line option. If neither of these was given explicitly, the
590 private key tag is shown as
592 since there is no fixed tag used under these circumstances.
594 .B current-private-key
595 The full key tag of the private key currently being used for this
596 association. This may change during the life of the association.
603 depending on whether or not (respectively) key-exchange is waiting for
604 the peer to initiate.
611 depending on whether or not (respectively) the peer is expected to
612 change its address unpredictably.
615 .BI "PING \fR[" options "\fR] " peer
616 Send a transport-level ping to the peer. The ping and its response are
617 not encrypted or authenticated. This command, possibly in conjunction
618 with tracing, is useful for ensuring that UDP packets are actually
619 flowing in both directions. See also the
625 line is printed describing the outcome:
628 .BI "ping-ok " millis
629 A response was received
631 after the ping was sent.
634 No response was received within the time allowed.
637 The peer was killed (probably by another admin connection) before a
638 response was received.
641 Options recognized for this command are:
645 .BI "\-background " tag
646 Run the command in the background, using the given
649 .BI "\-timeout " time
652 seconds before giving up on a response. The default is 5 seconds. The
654 is expressed as a nonnegative integer followed optionally by
660 for days, hours, minutes, or seconds respectively; if no suffix is
661 given, seconds are assumed.
669 line containing just the number of the UDP port used by the
671 server, for the given address
673 (or one chosen arbitrarily if omitted -- though
675 tries to use the same port number consistently so this is not a likely
676 problem in practice). If you've allowed your server to allocate a port
677 dynamically, this is how to find out which one it chose.
680 Instructs the server to recheck its keyring files. The server checks
681 these periodically anyway but it may be necessary to force a recheck,
682 for example after adding a new peer key.
685 Instructs the server to exit immediately. A warning is sent.
688 Returns information about the server, in the form of key-value pairs.
689 The following keys are used.
693 A keyword naming the implementation of the
695 server. The current implementation is called
699 The server's version number, as reported by
707 if the server has or hasn't (respectively) become a daemon.
710 .BI "SETIFNAME " peer " " new-name
711 Informs the server that the
713 tunnel-interface name has been changed to
715 This is useful if firewalling decisions are made based on interface
716 names: a setup script for a particular peer can change the name, and
717 then update the server's records so that they're accurate.
722 lines, each containing one or more statistics in the form
723 .IB name = value \fR.
724 The statistics-gathering is experimental and subject to change.
726 .BI "SVCCLAIM " service " " version
727 Attempts to claim the named
731 The claim is successful if the service is currently unclaimed, or if
732 a version earlier than
734 is provided; otherwise the command fails with the error
735 .BR "service-exists" .
737 .BI "SVCENSURE " service " \fR[" version \fR]
740 is provided, and (if specified) to at least the given
742 An error is reported if these conditions are not met; otherwise the
743 command succeeds silently.
745 .BI "SVCFAIL " jobid " " tokens \fR...
750 response to the service job with the given
754 as the reason for failure. The job is closed.
756 .BI "SVCINFO " jobid " " tokens \fR...
761 response to the service job with the given
765 as the info message. The job remains open.
768 Output a line of the form
775 for each service currently provided.
783 response to the service job with the given
787 .BI "SVCQUERY " service
790 lines in key-value format, describing the named
792 The following keys are used.
799 The service's version string.
802 .BI "SVCRELEASE " service
803 Announce that the client no longer wishes to provide the named
806 .BI "SVCSUBMIT \fR[" options "\fR] " service " " command " " arguments \fR...
807 Submit a job to the provider of the given
813 The following options are accepted.
817 .BI "\-background " tag
818 Run the command in the background, using the given
821 .BI "\-version " version
822 Ensure that at least the given
824 of the service is available before submitting the job.
828 .BR "TRACE " [\fIoptions\fP]
829 Selects trace outputs: see
831 above. Message types provided are:
834 Currently, the following tracing options are supported:
837 Tunnel events: reception of packets to be encrypted, and injection of
838 successfully-decrypted packets.
841 Peer management events: creation and destruction of peer attachments,
842 and arrival of messages.
845 Administration interface: acceptance of new connections, and handling of
846 the backgroud name-resolution required by the
851 Handling of symmetric keysets: creation and expiry of keysets, and
852 encryption and decryption of messages.
855 Key exchange: reception, parsing and emission of key exchange messages.
858 Key management: loading keys and checking for file modifications.
861 Display information about challenge issuing and verification.
864 Display contents of packets sent and received by the tunnel and/or peer
868 Display inputs, outputs and intermediate results of cryptographic
869 operations. This includes plaintext and key material. Use with
881 outputs provide extra detail for other outputs. Specifying
887 isn't useful; neither is specifying
898 For each available tunnel driver, an
900 line is printed giving its name.
903 Causes the server to emit an
905 line stating its software version, as two tokens: the server name, and
906 its version string. The server name
908 is reserved to the Straylight/Edgeware implementation.
910 .BR "WATCH " [\fIoptions\fP]
911 Enables or disables asynchronous broadcasts
912 .IR "for the current connection only" .
915 above. The default watch state for the connection the server opens
916 automatically on stdin/stdout is to show warnings and trace messages;
917 other connections show no asynchronous broadcast messages. (This is
918 done in order to guarantee that a program reading the server's stdout
919 does not miss any warnings.)
922 Message types provided are:
940 .BI "WARN " tokens\fR...
943 warning to all interested administration clients.
945 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
948 .\"* 20 Error messages (FAIL codes)
953 messages are sent to clients as a result of errors during command
961 server is already running as a daemon.
963 .BI "bad-addr-syntax " message
964 (For commands accepting socket addresses.) The address couldn't be
967 .BI "bad-base64 " message
968 (For commands accepting Base64-encoded input.) The Base64-encoded
971 .BI "bad-syntax " cmd " " message
972 (For any command.) The command couldn't be understood: e.g., the number
973 of arguments was wrong.
975 .BI "bad-time-spec " token
978 is not a valid time interval specification. Acceptable time
979 specifications are nonnegative integers followed optionally by
985 for days, hours, minutes, or seconds, respectively.
987 .BI "bad-trace-option " char
990 An unknown trace option was requested.
992 .BI "bad-watch-option " char
995 An unknown watch option was requested.
997 .BI "daemon-error " ecode " " message
1000 An error occurred during the attempt to become a daemon, as reported by
1003 .BI "invalid-port " number
1006 The given port number is out of range.
1008 .BI "not-service-provider " service
1011 The invoking client is not the current provider of the named
1013 and is therefore not allowed to release it.
1015 .BI "peer-create-fail " peer
1020 failed for some reason. A warning should have been emitted explaining
1023 .BI "peer-addr-exists " address\fR...
1026 There is already a peer with the given
1029 .BI "peer-exists " peer
1032 There is already a peer named
1035 .B "ping-send-failed"
1036 The attempt to send a ping packet failed, probably due to lack of
1039 .B "provider-failed"
1042 The service provider disconnected without sending back a final reply to
1045 .B "provider-overloaded"
1048 The service provider has too many jobs queued up for it already.
1050 .BI "resolve-error " hostname
1055 could not be resolved.
1057 .BI "resolver-timeout " hostname
1062 took too long to resolve.
1064 .BI "service-exists " service " " version
1067 Another client is already providing the stated
1072 .BI "service-too-old " service " " version
1081 is available, which does not meet the stated requirements.
1083 .BI "tag-exists " tag
1084 (For long-running commands.) The named
1086 is already the tag of an outstanding job.
1088 .BI "unknown-address-family " afam
1095 .BI "unknown-command " token
1100 .BI "unknown-jobid " jobid
1108 is not recognized as identifying an outstanding job. It may have just
1111 .BI "unknown-peer " name
1119 There is no peer called
1122 .BI "unknown-port " port
1127 couldn't be found in
1130 .BI "unknown-service " service
1139 is not recognized as the name of a client-provided service.
1141 .BI "unknown-tag " tag
1146 is not the tag for any outstanding background job. It may have just
1149 .BI "unknown-tunnel " tun
1154 is not the name of any known tunnel driver.
1156 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
1159 .\"* 30 Notification broadcasts (NOTE codes)
1160 The following notifications are sent to clients who request them.
1162 .BI "ADD " peer " " ifname " " address \fR...
1163 A new peer has been added. The peer's name is
1165 its tunnel is network interface
1167 and its network address is
1171 The server has forked off into the sunset and become a daemon.
1173 .BI "GREET " challenge " " address \fR...
1174 A valid greeting was received, with the given challenge (exactly as it
1187 finished successfully.
1192 has begun or restarted. If key exchange keeps failing, this message
1193 will be repeated periodically.
1195 .BI "NEWADDR " peer " " address
1198 IP address has been changed to
1201 .BI "NEWIFNAME " peer " " old-name " " new-name
1204 tunnel interface name has been changed from
1212 .BI "SVCCLAIM " service " " version
1215 is now available, at the stated
1218 .BI "SVCRELEASE " service
1221 is no longer available.
1223 .BI "USER " tokens\fR...
1224 An administration client issued a notification using the
1228 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
1231 .\"* 40 Warning broadcasts (WARN codes)
1233 There are many possible warnings. They are categorized according to
1236 Many of these warnings report system errors. These are reported as a
1237 pair of tokens, described below as
1243 is a string of the form
1247 value of the error; the
1249 is the `human-readable' form of the message, as reported by
1251 .SS "ABORT warnings"
1252 These all indicate that the
1254 server has become unable to continue. If enabled, the server will dump
1255 core in its configuration directory.
1257 .BI "ABORT repeated-select-errors"
1258 The main event loop is repeatedly failing. If the server doesn't quit,
1259 it will probably waste all available CPU doing nothing.
1260 .SS "ADMIN warnings"
1261 These indicate a problem with the administration socket interface.
1263 .BI "ADMIN accept-error " ecode " " message
1264 There was an error while attempting to accept a connection from a new
1267 .BI "ADMIN client-write-error " ecode " " message
1268 There was an error sending data to a client. The connection to the
1269 client has been closed.
1271 These indicate errors in challenges, either in the
1273 command or in greeting packets.
1275 .B "CHAL impossible-challenge"
1276 The server hasn't issued any challenges yet. Quite how anyone else
1277 thought he could make one up is hard to imagine.
1279 .B "CHAL incorrect-tag"
1280 Challenge received contained the wrong authentication data. It might be
1281 very stale, or a forgery.
1283 .B "CHAL invalid-challenge"
1284 Challenge received was the wrong length. We might have changed MAC
1285 algorithms since the challenge was issued, or it might just be rubbish.
1287 .B "CHAL replay duplicated-sequence"
1288 Challenge received was a definite replay of an old challenge. Someone's
1291 .B "CHAL replay old-sequence"
1292 Challenge received was old, but maybe not actually a replay. Try again.
1293 .SS "KEYMGMT warnings"
1294 These indicate a problem with the keyring files, or the keys stored in
1295 them. The first token is either
1301 in the descriptions below) indicating which keyring file is problematic,
1302 and the second token is the filename of the keyring. Frequently a key
1303 tag may be given next, preceded by the token
1306 .BI "KEYMGMT private-keyring " file " key " tag " incorrect-public-key"
1307 The private key doesn't record the correct corresponding public key.
1309 .BI "KEYMGMT public-keyring " file " key " tag " algorithm-mismatch"
1310 A peer's public key doesn't request the same algorithms as our private
1313 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " bad-tag-length " len
1314 The key attributes specify the length of MAC tag as
1316 but this is an invalid value \(en either too large or not a multiple of
1319 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " bad-tag-length-string " str
1320 The key attributes contain
1322 where a MAC tag length was expected. The key was generated wrongly.
1324 .BI "KEYMGMT private-keyring " file " key " tag " changed-group"
1325 The private keyring has been changed, but the new private key can't be
1326 used because it uses a different group for Diffie\(enHellman key
1329 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " io-error " ecode " " message
1330 A system error occurred while opening or reading the keyring file.
1332 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " unknown-bulk-transform " bulk
1333 The key specifies the use of an unknown bulk-crypto transform
1335 Maybe the key was generated wrongly, or maybe the version of Catacomb
1336 installed is too old.
1338 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " unknown-cipher " cipher
1339 The key specifies the use of an unknown symmetric encryption algorithm
1341 Maybe the key was generated wrongly, or maybe the version of
1342 Catacomb installed is too old.
1344 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " unknown-group-type " type
1345 The key specifies the use of a Diffie\(enHellman group of an unknown
1347 Maybe the key was generated wrongly, or maybe the version of
1351 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " unknown-hash " hash
1352 The key specifies the use of an unknown hash function
1354 Maybe the key was generated wrongly, or maybe the version of Catacomb
1355 installed is too old.
1357 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " unknown-mac " mac
1358 The key specifies the use of an unknown message authentication code
1360 Maybe the key was generated wrongly, or maybe the version of Catacomb
1361 installed is too old.
1363 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " unknown-mgf-cipher " mgf
1364 The key specifies the use of an unknown symmetric encryption function
1366 for mask generation. Maybe the key was generated wrongly, or maybe the
1367 version of Catacomb installed is too old.
1369 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " unknown-serialization-format " ser
1370 The key specifies the use of an unknown serialization format
1372 for hashing group elements. Maybe the key was generated wrongly, or
1373 maybe the version of Catacomb installed is too old.
1375 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " no-hmac-for-hash " hash
1376 No message authentication code was given explicitly, and there's no
1377 implementation of HMAC for the selected hash function
1380 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " " alg " " name " no-key-size " hashsz
1387 The named algorithm requires more key material than the hash function
1388 can provide. You must change either the hash function, or the cipher or
1391 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key " tag " mgf " mgf " restrictive-key-schedule"
1392 The cipher selected for mask-generation is unsuitable because it can't
1393 accept arbitrary-sized keys.
1395 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " key-not-found " tag
1398 couldn't be found in the keyring.
1400 .BI "KEYMGMT " which "-keyring " file " line " line " " message
1401 The contents of the keyring file are invalid. There may well be a bug
1406 These indicate problems during key-exchange. Many indicate either a bug
1407 in the server (either yours or the remote one), or some kind of attack
1408 in progress. All name a
1410 as the second token: this is the peer the packet is apparently from,
1411 though it may have been sent by an attacker instead.
1413 In the descriptions below,
1415 is one of the tokens
1424 .BI "KX " peer " algorithms-mismatch local-private-key " privtag " peer-public-key " pubtag
1425 The algorithms specified in the peer's public key
1427 don't match the ones described in the private key
1430 .BI "KX " peer " bad-expected-reply-log"
1433 uses in its protocol contain a check value which proves that the
1434 challenge is honest. This message indicates that the check value
1435 supplied is wrong: someone is attempting to use bogus challenges to
1438 server to leak private key information. No chance!
1440 .BI "KX " peer " decrypt-failed reply\fR|\fBswitch-ok"
1441 A symmetrically-encrypted portion of a key-exchange message failed to
1444 .BI "KX " peer " invalid " msgtoken
1445 A key-exchange message was malformed. This almost certainly indicates a
1448 .BI "KX " peer " incorrect cookie\fR|\fBswitch-rq\fR|\fBswitch-ok"
1449 A message didn't contain the right magic data. This may be a replay of
1450 some old exchange, or random packets being sent in an attempt to waste
1453 .BI "KX " peer " " which "-key-expired"
1454 The local private key or the peer's public key (distinguished by
1456 has expired. Either you or the peer's maintainer should have arranged
1457 for a replacement before now.
1459 .BI "KX " peer " sending-cookie"
1460 We've received too many bogus pre-challenge messages. Someone is trying
1461 to flood us with key-exchange messages and make us waste CPU on doing
1462 hard asymmetric crypto sums.
1464 .BI "KX " peer " unexpected " msgtoken
1465 The message received wasn't appropriate for this stage of the key
1466 exchange process. This may mean that one of our previous packets got
1469 it may simply mean that the peer has recently restarted.
1471 .BI "KX " peer " unknown-challenge"
1472 The peer is asking for an answer to a challenge which we don't know
1473 about. This may mean that we've been inundated with challenges from
1474 some malicious source
1475 .I who can read our messages
1476 and discarded the valid one.
1478 .BI "KX " peer " unknown-message 0x" nn
1479 An unknown key-exchange message arrived.
1481 These are largely concerned with management of peers and the low-level
1482 details of the network protocol. The second token is usually the name of
1485 if none is relevant.
1487 .BI "PEER " peer " bad-packet no-type"
1488 An empty packet arrived. This is very strange.
1490 .BI "PEER " peer " bad-packet unknown-category 0x" nn
1491 The message category
1493 (in hex) isn't understood. Probably a strange random packet from
1494 somewhere; could be an unlikely bug.
1496 .BI "PEER " peer " bad-packet unknown-type 0x" nn
1499 (in hex) isn't understood. Probably a strange random packet from
1500 somewhere; could be an unlikely bug.
1502 .BI "PEER " peer " corrupt-encrypted-ping"
1503 The peer sent a ping response which matches an outstanding ping, but its
1504 payload is wrong. There's definitely a bug somewhere.
1506 .BI "PEER " peer " corrupt-transport-ping"
1507 The peer (apparently) sent a ping response which matches an outstanding
1508 ping, but its payload is wrong. Either there's a bug, or the bad guys
1509 are playing tricks on you.
1511 .BI "PEER " peer " decrypt-failed"
1512 An encrypted IP packet failed to decrypt. It may have been mangled in
1513 transit, or may be a very old packet from an expired previous session
1514 key. There is usually a considerable overlap in the validity periods of
1515 successive session keys, so this shouldn't occur unless the key exchange
1516 takes ages or fails.
1518 .BI "PEER " peer " malformed-encrypted-ping"
1519 The peer sent a ping response which is hopelessly invalid. There's
1520 definitely a bug somewhere.
1522 .BI "PEER " peer " malformed-transport-ping"
1523 The peer (apparently) sent a ping response which is hopelessly invalid.
1524 Either there's a bug, or the bad guys are playing tricks on you.
1526 .BI "PEER " peer " packet-build-failed"
1527 There wasn't enough space in our buffer to put the packet we wanted to
1528 send. Shouldn't happen.
1530 .BI "PEER \- socket-read-error " ecode " " message
1531 An error occurred trying to read an incoming packet.
1533 .BI "PEER " peer " socket-write-error " ecode " " message
1534 An error occurred attempting to send a network packet. We lost that
1537 .BI "PEER " peer " unexpected-encrypted-ping 0x" id
1538 The peer sent an encrypted ping response whose id doesn't match any
1539 outstanding ping. Maybe it was delayed for longer than the server was
1540 willing to wait, or maybe the peer has gone mad.
1542 .BI "PEER \- unexpected-source " address\fR...
1543 A packet arrived from
1545 (a network address \(en see above), but no peer is known at that
1546 address. This may indicate a misconfiguration, or simply be a result of
1547 one end of a connection being set up before the other.
1549 .BI "PEER " peer " unexpected-transport-ping 0x" id
1550 The peer (apparently) sent a transport ping response whose id doesn't
1551 match any outstanding ping. Maybe it was delayed for longer than the
1552 server was willing to wait, or maybe the peer has gone mad; or maybe
1553 there are bad people trying to confuse you.
1554 .SS "PRIVSEP warnings"
1555 These indicate problems with the privilege-separation helper process.
1556 (The server tries to drop its privileges when it starts up, leaving a
1557 privileged helper process behind which will create and hand over tunnel
1558 descriptors on request, but hopefully not do anything else especially
1559 dangerous. Tunnel descriptors are not completely safe, but this is
1560 probably better than nothing.)
1562 .BI "PRIVSEP child-exited " rc
1563 The helper process exited normally with status
1565 Status 0 means that it thought the server didn't want it any more; 1
1566 means that it was invoked incorrectly; 127 means that some system call
1569 .BI "PRIVSEP child-killed " sig
1570 The helper process was killed by signal number
1573 .BI "PRIVSEP child-died " status
1574 The helper process died in some unexpected way;
1575 .I status is the raw status code returned by
1577 because the server didn't understand how to decode it.
1579 .BI "PRIVSEP helper-died"
1580 A tunnel driver requires a tunnel descriptor from the helper, but the
1581 helper isn't running so this won't work.
1583 .BI "PRIVSEP helper-read-error " ecode " " message
1584 The server failed to read a response from the helper process.
1586 .BI "PRIVSEP helper-short-read"
1587 The helper process didn't send back enough data, and has likely crashed.
1589 .BI "PRIVSEP helper-write-error " ecode " " message
1590 The server failed to send a message to the helper process.
1592 .BI "PRIVSEP no-fd-from-helper"
1593 The helper process sent back a positive response, but didn't include the
1594 requested tunnel descriptor.
1596 .BI "PRIVSEP unknown-response-code"
1597 The helper process sent back an incomprehensible reply. It's probably
1598 very confused and may crash.
1599 .SS "SERVER warnings"
1600 These indicate problems concerning the server process as a whole.
1602 .BI "SERVER ignore signal " name
1603 A signal arrived, but the server ignored it. Currently this happens for
1605 because that's a popular way of telling daemons to re-read their
1606 configuration files. Since
1608 re-reads its keyrings automatically and has no other configuration
1609 files, it's not relevant, but it seemed better to ignore the signal than
1612 .BI "SERVER quit signal " \fR[\fInn\fR|\fIname\fR]
1613 A signal arrived and
1617 .BI "SERVER quit admin-request"
1618 A client of the administration interface issued a
1622 .BI "SERVER quit foreground-eof"
1623 The server is running in foreground mode (the
1625 option), and encountered end-of-file on standard input.
1627 .BI "SERVER select-error " ecode " " message
1628 An error occurred in the server's main event loop. This is bad: if it
1629 happens too many times, the server will abort.
1631 .BI "SERVER waitpid-error " ecode " " message
1632 The server was informed that one of its child processes had exited, but
1633 couldn't retrieve the child's status.
1635 These are concerned with the symmetric encryption and decryption
1638 .BI "SYMM replay old-sequence"
1639 A packet was received with an old sequence number. It may just have
1640 been delayed or duplicated, or it may have been an attempt at a replay
1643 .BI "SYMM replay duplicated-sequence"
1644 A packet was received with a sequence number we've definitely seen
1645 before. It may be an accidental duplication because the 'net is like
1646 that, or a deliberate attempt at a replay.
1648 These concern the workings of the system-specific tunnel driver. The
1649 second token is the name of the tunnel interface in question, or
1653 .BI "TUN \- bsd no-tunnel-devices"
1654 The driver couldn't find an available tunnel device. Maybe if you
1657 files, it will work.
1659 .BI "TUN \- " tun-name " open-error " device " " ecode " " message
1660 An attempt to open the tunnel device file
1664 .BI "TUN \- linux config-error " ecode " " message
1665 Configuring the Linux TUN/TAP interface failed.
1667 .BI "TUN " ifname " " tun-name " read-error " ecode " " message
1668 Reading from the tunnel device failed.
1670 .BI "TUN " ifname " " tun-name " write-error " ecode " " message
1671 Writing from the tunnel device failed.
1673 .BI "TUN " ifname " slip bad-escape"
1674 The SLIP driver encountered a escaped byte it wasn't expecting to see.
1675 The erroneous packet will be ignored.
1677 .BI "TUN " ifname " slip eof"
1678 The SLIP driver encountered end-of-file on its input descriptor.
1679 Pending data is discarded, and no attempt is made to read any more data
1680 from that interface ever.
1682 .BI "TUN " ifname " slip escape-end"
1683 The SLIP driver encountered an escaped `end' marker. This probably
1684 means that someone's been sending it junk. The erroneous packet is
1685 discarded, and we hope that we've rediscovered synchronization.
1687 .BI "TUN \- slip fork-error " ecode " " message
1688 The SLIP driver encountered an error forking a child process while
1689 allocating a new dynamic interface.
1691 .BI "TUN \- slip no-slip-interfaces"
1692 The driver ran out of static SLIP interfaces. Either preallocate more,
1693 or use dynamic SLIP interface allocation.
1695 .BI "TUN " ifname " slip overflow"
1696 The SLIP driver gave up reading a packet because it got too large.
1698 .BI "TUN \- slip pipe-error " ecode " " message
1699 The SLIP driver encountered an error creating pipes while allocating a
1700 new dynamic interface.
1702 .BI "TUN \- slip read-ifname-failed " ecode " " message
1703 The SLIP driver encountered an error reading the name of a dynamically
1704 allocated interface. Maybe the allocation script is broken.
1706 .BI "TUN \- unet config-error " ecode " " message
1707 Configuring the Linux Unet interface failed. Unet is obsolete and
1708 shouldn't be used any more.
1710 .BI "TUN \- unet getinfo-error " ecode " " message
1711 Reading information about the Unet interface failed. Unet is obsolete
1712 and shouldn't be used any more.
1714 These are issued by administration clients using the
1718 .BI "USER " tokens\fR...
1719 An administration client issued a warning.
1722 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
1725 .SS "Command responses"
1728 .BI "BGFAIL " tag " " tokens \fR...
1729 .BI "BGINFO " tag " " tokens \fR...
1731 .BI "FAIL " tokens \fR...
1732 .BI "INFO " tokens \fR...
1737 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
1743 .IR "The Trivial IP Encryption Protocol" .
1745 .\"--------------------------------------------------------------------------
1748 Mark Wooding, <mdw@distorted.org.uk>
1750 .\"----- That's all, folks --------------------------------------------------