java.security.Key Maven / Gradle / Ivy
/*
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This work corresponds to the API signatures of JSR 219: Foundation
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JSR 219 specification, which is available at
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*/
package java.security;
/**
* The Key interface is the top-level interface for all keys. It
* defines the functionality shared by all key objects. All keys
* have three characteristics:
*
*
*
* - An Algorithm
*
*
This is the key algorithm for that key. The key algorithm is usually
* an encryption or asymmetric operation algorithm (such as DSA or
* RSA), which will work with those algorithms and with related
* algorithms (such as MD5 with RSA, SHA-1 with RSA, Raw DSA, etc.)
* The name of the algorithm of a key is obtained using the
* {@link #getAlgorithm() getAlgorithm} method.
*
*
- An Encoded Form
*
*
This is an external encoded form for the key used when a standard
* representation of the key is needed outside the Java Virtual Machine,
* as when transmitting the key to some other party. The key
* is encoded according to a standard format (such as
* X.509 SubjectPublicKeyInfo or PKCS#8), and
* is returned using the {@link #getEncoded() getEncoded} method.
* Note: The syntax of the ASN.1 type SubjectPublicKeyInfo
* is defined as follows:
*
*
* SubjectPublicKeyInfo ::= SEQUENCE {
* algorithm AlgorithmIdentifier,
* subjectPublicKey BIT STRING }
*
* AlgorithmIdentifier ::= SEQUENCE {
* algorithm OBJECT IDENTIFIER,
* parameters ANY DEFINED BY algorithm OPTIONAL }
*
*
* For more information, see
* RFC 2459:
* Internet X.509 Public Key Infrastructure Certificate and CRL Profile.
*
*
*
- A Format
*
*
This is the name of the format of the encoded key. It is returned
* by the {@link #getFormat() getFormat} method.
*
*
*
* Keys are generally obtained through key generators, certificates,
* or various Identity classes used to manage keys.
* Keys may also be obtained from key specifications (transparent
* representations of the underlying key material) through the use of a key
* factory (see {@link KeyFactory}).
* NOTE: java.security.Identity is found in J2ME CDC profiles such as
* J2ME Foundation Profile.
*
* @see PublicKey
* @see PrivateKey
* @see KeyPair
* @see KeyPairGenerator
* @see KeyFactory
* @see java.security.spec.KeySpec
* @see Identity
* @see Signer
*
* @version 1.47 00/02/02
* @author Benjamin Renaud
*/
public interface Key extends java.io.Serializable
{
/**
* The class fingerprint that is set to indicate
* serialization compatibility with a previous
* version of the class.
*/
public static final long serialVersionUID = 6603384152749567654L;
/**
* Returns the standard algorithm name for this key. For
* example, "DSA" would indicate that this key is a DSA key.
* See Appendix A in the
* Java Cryptography Architecture API Specification & Reference
* for information about standard algorithm names.
*
* @return the name of the algorithm associated with this key.
*/
public String getAlgorithm();
/**
* Returns the name of the primary encoding format of this key,
* or null if this key does not support encoding.
* The primary encoding format is
* named in terms of the appropriate ASN.1 data format, if an
* ASN.1 specification for this key exists.
* For example, the name of the ASN.1 data format for public
* keys is SubjectPublicKeyInfo, as
* defined by the X.509 standard; in this case, the returned format is
* "X.509". Similarly,
* the name of the ASN.1 data format for private keys is
* PrivateKeyInfo,
* as defined by the PKCS #8 standard; in this case, the returned format is
* "PKCS#8".
*
* @return the primary encoding format of the key.
*/
public String getFormat();
/**
* Returns the key in its primary encoding format, or null
* if this key does not support encoding.
*
* @return the encoded key, or null if the key does not support
* encoding.
*/
public byte[] getEncoded();
}