On Tuesday, 09.09.2003 at 16:58 +0100, A. S. Budden wrote: > > > Just noticed a bit of an odd problem. If I send an email and > > > select the pgp sign option, it asks me for my passphrase as > > > expected. If I'm in an xterm (konsole actually) it works fine, if > > > I'm in a virtual console (I think that's what it's called -- what > > > you get by typing Ctrl-Alt-F1), it fails. Having investigated > > > this, I think it's got something to do with the fact that in my > > > password (I hope I'm not giving too much away here), there is the > > > pound sign (as in GBP -- pounds sterling, shift-3 on a UK > > > keyboard). If I type this symbol at the terminal prompt, it > > > appears as expected, but if I type it in any of the mutt prompts, > > > nothing happens at all. > > > > > > Can anyone offer any suggestions please? > > > > <serious>Change your passphrase!</serious> > > Why? It works in virtually every situation I use it (with the > exception of the above), the pound sign is on every keyboard I ever > use or am ever likely to use and I would guess (probably with no > foundation at all) that it's not likely to be used in any brute force > hacking algorithms. > > If you're going to tell me to change my passphrase in a <serious> way, > you could at least give me, say, ONE good reason... OK, here goes ... :-) The British pound sign is not a 'universal' ASCII character (that's the wrong term, but hopefully you can see what I mean). The fact that it's on the _keyboard_ is irrelevant. The problem is that the pound sign might not exist consistently across different locales and other settings. If I use a system with French settings, for example, I wouldn't be surprise if the pound sign failed to work. In terms of solving your problem, you could investigate the Mutt build options '--enable-locales-fix' and '--without-wc-funcs'. This is probably not the right way to fix the problem, but it might help. In terms of finding a simple way to solve your problem, the single easiest thing to change is your passphrase, hence the '<serious>' tag :-) Dave. -- Dave Ewart Dave.Ewart@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Computing Manager, Epidemiology Unit, Oxford Cancer Research UK PGP: CC70 1883 BD92 E665 B840 118B 6E94 2CFD 694D E370
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