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Ask HN: How to ensure reasonable entropy in Linux?

2 pointsby josh-wraleabout 11 years ago
So today I am trying to install FreeIPA in a VM on Proxmox VE. Neither the hypervisor nor the guest seem to have sufficient entropy to complete the install, per the developers. On advice from IRC, I found out how to check entropy using &#x27;cat &#x2F;proc&#x2F;sys&#x2F;kernel&#x2F;random&#x2F;entropy_avail&#x27;.<p>Results:<p><pre><code> - desktop: 1456 - hypervisor: 262 - guest: 94 </code></pre> Suggestions I&#x27;ve seen so far are:<p>1. Implement VirtIO-RNG for my VM. This would share and throttle the hypervisor&#x27;s &#x2F;dev&#x2F;random with the guest. This does little good IMHO, if even the hypervisor is starved of entropy. http:&#x2F;&#x2F;wiki.qemu-project.org&#x2F;Features-Done&#x2F;VirtIORNG<p>2. haveged - &quot;A simple entropy daemon&quot;; Any thoughts on this? http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.issihosts.com&#x2F;haveged&#x2F;<p>I would enjoy having a hardware RNG, but I wonder what software can do to solve this issue. https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Comparison_of_hardware_random_number_generators<p>I seem to remember the random numbers as a service post about the NIST recently. Is that worth looking into for this?

2 comments

jlgaddisabout 11 years ago
haveged seems to work quite well and, before I started using it months ago, I ran some of its output through dieharder, ent, etc.<p>There&#x27;s also rngd which can also use the RNG in a TPM, if one is available.
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josh-wraleabout 11 years ago
Wishing nerdy stuff like this would get more upvotes.. :)