Changing preferences

[David Shaw]

On Sep 17, 2008, at 6:24 PM, Robert J. Hansen wrote:

>> When I use showpref command, the cypher algorithms are shown in the
>> right order according to gpg.conf, but the digest order is not in the
>> right order...
>
> 'showpref' is horribly misnamed.  You are advertising your  
> cryptographic
> capabilities far more than you are specifying a preference in  
> algorithms.

I disagree with this.  The preference system is for preferences, not  
capabilities.  Most installations are capable of using many more  
algorithms than are present in the preference list (GPG is capable of  
using Blowfish and Twofish, but doesn't list them by default).  The  
point of the list is to indicate the algorithm that the user prefers,  
in the order that the user prefers.  There is an assumption that a  
user won't prefer an algorithm that they are not capable of, but that  
is reasonable: most users prefer to be able to read their incoming  
messages.

David