RE: dissemination of public encryption certificates

["Blake Ramsdell" <[e-mail]>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [e-mail] 
> [mailto:[e-mail]] On Behalf Of 
> Hallam-Baker, Phillip
> Sent: Thursday, August 14, 2003 11:17 AM
> To: '[e-mail]'; Hallam-Baker, Phillip
> Cc: 'Steve Hole'; Julien Pierre; [e-mail]
> Subject: RE: dissemination of public encryption certificates 
> 
> XKMS does not answer that question because I can't think of a 
> situation
> where is would be of interest. The certificate is simply a 
> data object that
> is created to establish the trustworthiness of a key. 
> Applications don't ask
> 'what is this good for?', they ask 'how do I do this task?'.

Well, I'm not sure I agree.  There are two major questions that
constantly need answers in the mind of an S/MIME client.  These are
pretty close to what Michael said in his message:

1. Given a particular email address, give me That Which Is Necessary and
Sufficient to send encrypted mail to that email address.

2. Given a particular certificate, is it suitable for signing mail that
came from a particular email address.  Michael said "what is it good
for", which I think is too broad a question.

If we're considering protocols that attempt to answer these types of
questions, those are the two questions that need to be answered by that
protocol (for interpersonal messaging with S/MIME, that is).

Blake