1GPGSM(1) GNU Privacy Guard 2.2 GPGSM(1)
2
6 gpgsm - CMS encryption and signing tool
7
9 gpgsm [--homedir dir] [--options file] [options] command [args]
10
14 gpgsm is a tool similar to gpg to provide digital encryption and sign‐
15 ing services on X.509 certificates and the CMS protocol. It is mainly
16 used as a backend for S/MIME mail processing. gpgsm includes a full
17 featured certificate management and complies with all rules defined for
18 the German Sphinx project.
19
25 Commands are not distinguished from options except for the fact that
26 only one command is allowed.
27 Commands not specific to the function
33 --version
37 Print the program version and licensing information. Note that
38 you cannot abbreviate this command.
39 --help, -h
42 Print a usage message summarizing the most useful command-line
43 options. Note that you cannot abbreviate this command.
44 --warranty
47 Print warranty information. Note that you cannot abbreviate
48 this command.
49 --dump-options
52 Print a list of all available options and commands. Note that
53 you cannot abbreviate this command.
54 Commands to select the type of operation
56 --encrypt
60 Perform an encryption. The keys the data is encrypted to must
61 be set using the option --recipient.
62 --decrypt
65 Perform a decryption; the type of input is automatically deter‐
66 mined. It may either be in binary form or PEM encoded; auto‐
67 matic determination of base-64 encoding is not done.
68 --sign Create a digital signature. The key used is either the fist one
71 found in the keybox or those set with the --local-user option.
72 --verify
75 Check a signature file for validity. Depending on the arguments
76 a detached signature may also be checked.
77 --server
80 Run in server mode and wait for commands on the stdin.
81 --call-dirmngr command [args]
84 Behave as a Dirmngr client issuing the request command with the
85 optional list of args. The output of the Dirmngr is printed
86 stdout. Please note that file names given as arguments should
87 have an absolute file name (i.e. commencing with /) because they
88 are passed verbatim to the Dirmngr and the working directory of
89 the Dirmngr might not be the same as the one of this client.
90 Currently it is not possible to pass data via stdin to the Dirm‐
91 ngr. command should not contain spaces.
92 This is command is required for certain maintaining tasks of the
94 dirmngr where a dirmngr must be able to call back to gpgsm. See
95 the Dirmngr manual for details.
96 --call-protect-tool arguments
99 Certain maintenance operations are done by an external program
100 call gpg-protect-tool; this is usually not installed in a direc‐
101 tory listed in the PATH variable. This command provides a sim‐
102 ple wrapper to access this tool. arguments are passed verbatim
103 to this command; use '--help' to get a list of supported opera‐
104 tions.
105 How to manage the certificates and keys
109 --generate-key
113 --gen-key
114 This command allows the creation of a certificate signing
115 request or a self-signed certificate. It is commonly used along
116 with the --output option to save the created CSR or certificate
117 into a file. If used with the --batch a parameter file is used
118 to create the CSR or certificate and it is further possible to
119 create non-self-signed certificates.
120 --list-keys
123 -k List all available certificates stored in the local key data‐
124 base. Note that the displayed data might be reformatted for
125 better human readability and illegal characters are replaced by
126 safe substitutes.
127 --list-secret-keys
130 -K List all available certificates for which a corresponding a
131 secret key is available.
132 --list-external-keys pattern
135 List certificates matching pattern using an external server.
136 This utilizes the dirmngr service.
137 --list-chain
140 Same as --list-keys but also prints all keys making up the
141 chain.
142 --dump-cert
146 --dump-keys
147 List all available certificates stored in the local key database
148 using a format useful mainly for debugging.
149 --dump-chain
152 Same as --dump-keys but also prints all keys making up the
153 chain.
154 --dump-secret-keys
157 List all available certificates for which a corresponding a
158 secret key is available using a format useful mainly for debug‐
159 ging.
160 --dump-external-keys pattern
163 List certificates matching pattern using an external server.
164 This utilizes the dirmngr service. It uses a format useful
165 mainly for debugging.
166 --keydb-clear-some-cert-flags
169 This is a debugging aid to reset certain flags in the key data‐
170 base which are used to cache certain certificate stati. It is
171 especially useful if a bad CRL or a weird running OCSP responder
172 did accidentally revoke certificate. There is no security issue
173 with this command because gpgsm always make sure that the valid‐
174 ity of a certificate is checked right before it is used.
175 --delete-keys pattern
178 Delete the keys matching pattern. Note that there is no command
179 to delete the secret part of the key directly. In case you need
180 to do this, you should run the command gpgsm --dump-secret-keys
181 KEYID before you delete the key, copy the string of hex-digits
182 in the ``keygrip'' line and delete the file consisting of these
183 hex-digits and the suffix .key from the ‘private-keys-v1.d’
184 directory below our GnuPG home directory (usually ‘~/.gnupg’).
185 --export [pattern]
188 Export all certificates stored in the Keybox or those specified
189 by the optional pattern. Those pattern consist of a list of user
190 ids (see: [how-to-specify-a-user-id]). When used along with the
191 --armor option a few informational lines are prepended before
192 each block. There is one limitation: As there is no commonly
193 agreed upon way to pack more than one certificate into an ASN.1
194 structure, the binary export (i.e. without using armor) works
195 only for the export of one certificate. Thus it is required to
196 specify a pattern which yields exactly one certificate.
197 Ephemeral certificate are only exported if all pattern are given
198 as fingerprints or keygrips.
199 --export-secret-key-p12 key-id
202 Export the private key and the certificate identified by key-id
203 using the PKCS#12 format. When used with the --armor option a
204 few informational lines are prepended to the output. Note, that
205 the PKCS#12 format is not very secure and proper transport secu‐
206 rity should be used to convey the exported key. (See: [option
207 --p12-charset].)
208 --export-secret-key-p8 key-id
211 --export-secret-key-raw key-id
212 Export the private key of the certificate identified by key-id
213 with any encryption stripped. The ...-raw command exports in
214 PKCS#1 format; the ...-p8 command exports in PKCS#8 format.
215 When used with the --armor option a few informational lines are
216 prepended to the output. These commands are useful to prepare a
217 key for use on a TLS server.
218 --import [files]
221 Import the certificates from the PEM or binary encoded files as
222 well as from signed-only messages. This command may also be
223 used to import a secret key from a PKCS#12 file.
224 --learn-card
227 Read information about the private keys from the smartcard and
228 import the certificates from there. This command utilizes the
229 gpg-agent and in turn the scdaemon.
230 --change-passphrase user_id
233 --passwd user_id
234 Change the passphrase of the private key belonging to the cer‐
235 tificate specified as user_id. Note, that changing the
236 passphrase/PIN of a smartcard is not yet supported.
237
240 GPGSM features a bunch of options to control the exact behaviour and to
241 change the default configuration.
242 How to change the configuration
248 These options are used to change the configuration and are usually
251 found in the option file.
252 --options file
257 Reads configuration from file instead of from the default per-
258 user configuration file. The default configuration file is
259 named ‘gpgsm.conf’ and expected in the ‘.gnupg’ directory
260 directly below the home directory of the user.
261 --homedir dir
264 Set the name of the home directory to dir. If this option is not
265 used, the home directory defaults to ‘~/.gnupg’. It is only
266 recognized when given on the command line. It also overrides
267 any home directory stated through the environment variable
268 ‘GNUPGHOME’ or (on Windows systems) by means of the Registry
269 entry HKCU\Software\GNU\GnuPG:HomeDir.
270 On Windows systems it is possible to install GnuPG as a portable
272 application. In this case only this command line option is con‐
273 sidered, all other ways to set a home directory are ignored.
274 To install GnuPG as a portable application under Windows, create
276 an empty file named ‘gpgconf.ctl’ in the same directory as the
277 tool ‘gpgconf.exe’. The root of the installation is then that
278 directory; or, if ‘gpgconf.exe’ has been installed directly
279 below a directory named ‘bin’, its parent directory. You also
280 need to make sure that the following directories exist and are
281 writable: ‘ROOT/home’ for the GnuPG home and
282 ‘ROOT/var/cache/gnupg’ for internal cache files.
283 -v
287 --verbose
289 Outputs additional information while running. You can increase
290 the verbosity by giving several verbose commands to gpgsm, such
291 as '-vv'.
292 --policy-file filename
295 Change the default name of the policy file to filename.
296 --agent-program file
299 Specify an agent program to be used for secret key operations.
300 The default value is determined by running the command gpgconf.
301 Note that the pipe symbol (|) is used for a regression test
302 suite hack and may thus not be used in the file name.
303 --dirmngr-program file
306 Specify a dirmngr program to be used for CRL checks. The
307 default value is ‘/usr/bin/dirmngr’.
308 --prefer-system-dirmngr
311 This option is obsolete and ignored.
312 --disable-dirmngr
315 Entirely disable the use of the Dirmngr.
316 --no-autostart
319 Do not start the gpg-agent or the dirmngr if it has not yet been
320 started and its service is required. This option is mostly use‐
321 ful on machines where the connection to gpg-agent has been redi‐
322 rected to another machines. If dirmngr is required on the
323 remote machine, it may be started manually using gpgconf
324 --launch dirmngr.
325 --no-secmem-warning
328 Do not print a warning when the so called "secure memory" cannot
329 be used.
330 --log-file file
333 When running in server mode, append all logging output to file.
334 Use ‘socket://’ to log to socket.
335 Certificate related options
338 --enable-policy-checks
343 --disable-policy-checks
344 By default policy checks are enabled. These options may be used
345 to change it.
346 --enable-crl-checks
349 --disable-crl-checks
350 By default the CRL checks are enabled and the DirMngr is used to
351 check for revoked certificates. The disable option is most use‐
352 ful with an off-line network connection to suppress this check.
353 --enable-trusted-cert-crl-check
356 --disable-trusted-cert-crl-check
357 By default the CRL for trusted root certificates are checked
358 like for any other certificates. This allows a CA to revoke its
359 own certificates voluntary without the need of putting all ever
360 issued certificates into a CRL. The disable option may be used
361 to switch this extra check off. Due to the caching done by the
362 Dirmngr, there will not be any noticeable performance gain.
363 Note, that this also disables possible OCSP checks for trusted
364 root certificates. A more specific way of disabling this check
365 is by adding the ``relax'' keyword to the root CA line of the
366 ‘trustlist.txt’
367 --force-crl-refresh
371 Tell the dirmngr to reload the CRL for each request. For better
372 performance, the dirmngr will actually optimize this by sup‐
373 pressing the loading for short time intervals (e.g. 30 minutes).
374 This option is useful to make sure that a fresh CRL is available
375 for certificates hold in the keybox. The suggested way of doing
376 this is by using it along with the option --with-validation for
377 a key listing command. This option should not be used in a con‐
378 figuration file.
379 --enable-ocsp
382 --disable-ocsp
383 By default OCSP checks are disabled. The enable option may be
384 used to enable OCSP checks via Dirmngr. If CRL checks are also
385 enabled, CRLs will be used as a fallback if for some reason an
386 OCSP request will not succeed. Note, that you have to allow
387 OCSP requests in Dirmngr's configuration too (option --allow-
388 ocsp) and configure Dirmngr properly. If you do not do so you
389 will get the error code 'Not supported'.
390 --auto-issuer-key-retrieve
393 If a required certificate is missing while validating the chain
394 of certificates, try to load that certificate from an external
395 location. This usually means that Dirmngr is employed to search
396 for the certificate. Note that this option makes a "web bug"
397 like behavior possible. LDAP server operators can see which
398 keys you request, so by sending you a message signed by a brand
399 new key (which you naturally will not have on your local key‐
400 box), the operator can tell both your IP address and the time
401 when you verified the signature.
402 --validation-model name
407 This option changes the default validation model. The only pos‐
408 sible values are "shell" (which is the default), "chain" which
409 forces the use of the chain model and "steed" for a new simpli‐
410 fied model. The chain model is also used if an option in the
411 ‘trustlist.txt’ or an attribute of the certificate requests it.
412 However the standard model (shell) is in that case always tried
413 first.
414 --ignore-cert-extension oid
417 Add oid to the list of ignored certificate extensions. The oid
418 is expected to be in dotted decimal form, like 2.5.29.3. This
419 option may be used more than once. Critical flagged certificate
420 extensions matching one of the OIDs in the list are treated as
421 if they are actually handled and thus the certificate will not
422 be rejected due to an unknown critical extension. Use this
423 option with care because extensions are usually flagged as crit‐
424 ical for a reason.
425 Input and Output
428 --armor
432 -a Create PEM encoded output. Default is binary output.
433 --base64
436 Create Base-64 encoded output; i.e. PEM without the header
437 lines.
438 --assume-armor
441 Assume the input data is PEM encoded. Default is to autodetect
442 the encoding but this is may fail.
443 --assume-base64
446 Assume the input data is plain base-64 encoded.
447 --assume-binary
450 Assume the input data is binary encoded.
451 --p12-charset name
455 gpgsm uses the UTF-8 encoding when encoding passphrases for
456 PKCS#12 files. This option may be used to force the passphrase
457 to be encoded in the specified encoding name. This is useful if
458 the application used to import the key uses a different encoding
459 and thus will not be able to import a file generated by gpgsm.
460 Commonly used values for name are Latin1 and CP850. Note that
461 gpgsm itself automagically imports any file with a passphrase
462 encoded to the most commonly used encodings.
463 --default-key user_id
467 Use user_id as the standard key for signing. This key is used
468 if no other key has been defined as a signing key. Note, that
469 the first --local-users option also sets this key if it has not
470 yet been set; however --default-key always overrides this.
471 --local-user user_id
475 -u user_id
477 Set the user(s) to be used for signing. The default is the
478 first secret key found in the database.
479 --recipient name
483 -r Encrypt to the user id name. There are several ways a user id
484 may be given (see: [how-to-specify-a-user-id]).
485 --output file
489 -o file
490 Write output to file. The default is to write it to stdout.
491 --with-key-data
496 Displays extra information with the --list-keys commands. Espe‐
497 cially a line tagged grp is printed which tells you the keygrip
498 of a key. This string is for example used as the file name of
499 the secret key. Implies --with-colons.
500 --with-validation
504 When doing a key listing, do a full validation check for each
505 key and print the result. This is usually a slow operation
506 because it requires a CRL lookup and other operations.
507 When used along with --import, a validation of the certificate
509 to import is done and only imported if it succeeds the test.
510 Note that this does not affect an already available certificate
511 in the DB. This option is therefore useful to simply verify a
512 certificate.
513 --with-md5-fingerprint
517 For standard key listings, also print the MD5 fingerprint of the
518 certificate.
519 --with-keygrip
522 Include the keygrip in standard key listings. Note that the
523 keygrip is always listed in --with-colons mode.
524 --with-secret
527 Include info about the presence of a secret key in public key
528 listings done with --with-colons.
529 How to change how the CMS is created
532 --include-certs n
536 Using n of -2 includes all certificate except for the root cert,
537 -1 includes all certs, 0 does not include any certs, 1 includes
538 only the signers cert and all other positive values include up
539 to n certificates starting with the signer cert. The default is
540 -2.
541 --cipher-algo oid
544 Use the cipher algorithm with the ASN.1 object identifier oid
545 for encryption. For convenience the strings 3DES, AES and
546 AES256 may be used instead of their OIDs. The default is AES
547 (2.16.840.1.101.3.4.1.2).
548 --digest-algo name
551 Use name as the message digest algorithm. Usually this algo‐
552 rithm is deduced from the respective signing certificate. This
553 option forces the use of the given algorithm and may lead to
554 severe interoperability problems.
555 Doing things one usually do not want to do
558 --extra-digest-algo name
564 Sometimes signatures are broken in that they announce a differ‐
565 ent digest algorithm than actually used. gpgsm uses a one-pass
566 data processing model and thus needs to rely on the announced
567 digest algorithms to properly hash the data. As a workaround
568 this option may be used to tell gpgsm to also hash the data
569 using the algorithm name; this slows processing down a little
570 bit but allows verification of such broken signatures. If gpgsm
571 prints an error like ``digest algo 8 has not been enabled'' you
572 may want to try this option, with 'SHA256' for name.
573 --faked-system-time epoch
577 This option is only useful for testing; it sets the system time
578 back or forth to epoch which is the number of seconds elapsed
579 since the year 1970. Alternatively epoch may be given as a full
580 ISO time string (e.g. "20070924T154812").
581 --with-ephemeral-keys
584 Include ephemeral flagged keys in the output of key listings.
585 Note that they are included anyway if the key specification for
586 a listing is given as fingerprint or keygrip.
587 --debug-level level
590 Select the debug level for investigating problems. level may be
591 a numeric value or by a keyword:
592 none No debugging at all. A value of less than 1 may be used
595 instead of the keyword.
596 basic Some basic debug messages. A value between 1 and 2 may
598 be used instead of the keyword.
599 advanced
601 More verbose debug messages. A value between 3 and 5 may
602 be used instead of the keyword.
603 expert Even more detailed messages. A value between 6 and 8 may
605 be used instead of the keyword.
606 guru All of the debug messages you can get. A value greater
608 than 8 may be used instead of the keyword. The creation
609 of hash tracing files is only enabled if the keyword is
610 used.
611 How these messages are mapped to the actual debugging flags is not
613 specified and may change with newer releases of this program. They are
614 however carefully selected to best aid in debugging.
615 --debug flags
618 This option is only useful for debugging and the behaviour may
619 change at any time without notice; using --debug-levels is the
620 preferred method to select the debug verbosity. FLAGS are bit
621 encoded and may be given in usual C-Syntax. The currently
622 defined bits are:
623 0 (1) X.509 or OpenPGP protocol related data
626 1 (2) values of big number integers
628 2 (4) low level crypto operations
630 5 (32) memory allocation
632 6 (64) caching
634 7 (128)
636 show memory statistics
637 9 (512)
639 write hashed data to files named dbgmd-000*
640 10 (1024)
642 trace Assuan protocol
643 Note, that all flags set using this option may get overridden by
645 --debug-level.
646 --debug-all
649 Same as --debug=0xffffffff
650 --debug-allow-core-dump
653 Usually gpgsm tries to avoid dumping core by well written code
654 and by disabling core dumps for security reasons. However, bugs
655 are pretty durable beasts and to squash them it is sometimes
656 useful to have a core dump. This option enables core dumps
657 unless the Bad Thing happened before the option parsing.
658 --debug-no-chain-validation
661 This is actually not a debugging option but only useful as such.
662 It lets gpgsm bypass all certificate chain validation checks.
663 --debug-ignore-expiration
666 This is actually not a debugging option but only useful as such.
667 It lets gpgsm ignore all notAfter dates, this is used by the
668 regression tests.
669 --passphrase-fd n
672 Read the passphrase from file descriptor n. Only the first line
673 will be read from file descriptor n. If you use 0 for n, the
674 passphrase will be read from STDIN. This can only be used if
675 only one passphrase is supplied.
676 Note that this passphrase is only used if the option --batch has
678 also been given.
679 --pinentry-mode mode
682 Set the pinentry mode to mode. Allowed values for mode are:
683 default
685 Use the default of the agent, which is ask.
686 ask Force the use of the Pinentry.
688 cancel Emulate use of Pinentry's cancel button.
690 error Return a Pinentry error (``No Pinentry'').
692 loopback
694 Redirect Pinentry queries to the caller. Note that in
695 contrast to Pinentry the user is not prompted again if he
696 enters a bad password.
697 --request-origin origin
700 Tell gpgsm to assume that the operation ultimately originated at
701 origin. Depending on the origin certain restrictions are
702 applied and the Pinentry may include an extra note on the ori‐
703 gin. Supported values for origin are: local which is the
704 default, remote to indicate a remote origin or browser for an
705 operation requested by a web browser.
706 --no-common-certs-import
709 Suppress the import of common certificates on keybox creation.
710 All the long options may also be given in the configuration file after
713 stripping off the two leading dashes.
714
718 There are different ways to specify a user ID to GnuPG. Some of them
719 are only valid for gpg others are only good for gpgsm. Here is the
720 entire list of ways to specify a key:
721 By key Id.
725 This format is deduced from the length of the string and its
726 content or 0x prefix. The key Id of an X.509 certificate are the
727 low 64 bits of its SHA-1 fingerprint. The use of key Ids is
728 just a shortcut, for all automated processing the fingerprint
729 should be used.
730 When using gpg an exclamation mark (!) may be appended to force
732 using the specified primary or secondary key and not to try and
733 calculate which primary or secondary key to use.
734 The last four lines of the example give the key ID in their long
736 form as internally used by the OpenPGP protocol. You can see the
737 long key ID using the option --with-colons.
738 234567C4
740 0F34E556E
741 01347A56A
742 0xAB123456
743 234AABBCC34567C4
745 0F323456784E56EAB
746 01AB3FED1347A5612
747 0x234AABBCC34567C4
748 By fingerprint.
753 This format is deduced from the length of the string and its
754 content or the 0x prefix. Note, that only the 20 byte version
755 fingerprint is available with gpgsm (i.e. the SHA-1 hash of the
756 certificate).
757 When using gpg an exclamation mark (!) may be appended to force
759 using the specified primary or secondary key and not to try and
760 calculate which primary or secondary key to use.
761 The best way to specify a key Id is by using the fingerprint.
763 This avoids any ambiguities in case that there are duplicated
764 key IDs.
765 1234343434343434C434343434343434
767 123434343434343C3434343434343734349A3434
768 0E12343434343434343434EAB3484343434343434
769 0xE12343434343434343434EAB3484343434343434
770 gpgsm also accepts colons between each pair of hexadecimal digits
773 because this is the de-facto standard on how to present X.509 finger‐
774 prints. gpg also allows the use of the space separated SHA-1 finger‐
775 print as printed by the key listing commands.
776 By exact match on OpenPGP user ID.
779 This is denoted by a leading equal sign. It does not make sense
780 for X.509 certificates.
781 =Heinrich Heine <heinrichh@uni-duesseldorf.de>
783 By exact match on an email address.
786 This is indicated by enclosing the email address in the usual
787 way with left and right angles.
788 <heinrichh@uni-duesseldorf.de>
790 By partial match on an email address.
794 This is indicated by prefixing the search string with an @.
795 This uses a substring search but considers only the mail address
796 (i.e. inside the angle brackets).
797 @heinrichh
799 By exact match on the subject's DN.
802 This is indicated by a leading slash, directly followed by the
803 RFC-2253 encoded DN of the subject. Note that you can't use the
804 string printed by gpgsm --list-keys because that one has been
805 reordered and modified for better readability; use --with-colons
806 to print the raw (but standard escaped) RFC-2253 string.
807 /CN=Heinrich Heine,O=Poets,L=Paris,C=FR
809 By exact match on the issuer's DN.
812 This is indicated by a leading hash mark, directly followed by a
813 slash and then directly followed by the RFC-2253 encoded DN of
814 the issuer. This should return the Root cert of the issuer.
815 See note above.
816 #/CN=Root Cert,O=Poets,L=Paris,C=FR
818 By exact match on serial number and issuer's DN.
822 This is indicated by a hash mark, followed by the hexadecimal
823 representation of the serial number, then followed by a slash
824 and the RFC-2253 encoded DN of the issuer. See note above.
825 #4F03/CN=Root Cert,O=Poets,L=Paris,C=FR
827 By keygrip.
830 This is indicated by an ampersand followed by the 40 hex digits
831 of a keygrip. gpgsm prints the keygrip when using the command
832 --dump-cert.
833 &D75F22C3F86E355877348498CDC92BD21010A480
835 By substring match.
839 This is the default mode but applications may want to explicitly
840 indicate this by putting the asterisk in front. Match is not
841 case sensitive.
842 Heine
844 *Heine
845 . and + prefixes
848 These prefixes are reserved for looking up mails anchored at the
849 end and for a word search mode. They are not yet implemented
850 and using them is undefined.
851 Please note that we have reused the hash mark identifier which
854 was used in old GnuPG versions to indicate the so called local-
855 id. It is not anymore used and there should be no conflict when
856 used with X.509 stuff.
857 Using the RFC-2253 format of DNs has the drawback that it is not
859 possible to map them back to the original encoding, however we
860 don't have to do this because our key database stores this
861 encoding as meta data.
862
866 $ gpgsm -er goo@bar.net <plaintext >ciphertext
867
872 There are a few configuration files to control certain aspects of
873 gpgsm's operation. Unless noted, they are expected in the current home
874 directory (see: [option --homedir]).
875 gpgsm.conf
879 This is the standard configuration file read by gpgsm on
880 startup. It may contain any valid long option; the leading two
881 dashes may not be entered and the option may not be abbreviated.
882 This default name may be changed on the command line (see:
883 [gpgsm-option --options]). You should backup this file.
884 policies.txt
888 This is a list of allowed CA policies. This file should list
889 the object identifiers of the policies line by line. Empty
890 lines and lines starting with a hash mark are ignored. Policies
891 missing in this file and not marked as critical in the certifi‐
892 cate will print only a warning; certificates with policies
893 marked as critical and not listed in this file will fail the
894 signature verification. You should backup this file.
895 For example, to allow only the policy 2.289.9.9, the file should
897 look like this:
898 # Allowed policies
900 2.289.9.9
901 qualified.txt
904 This is the list of root certificates used for qualified cer‐
905 tificates. They are defined as certificates capable of creating
906 legally binding signatures in the same way as handwritten signa‐
907 tures are. Comments start with a hash mark and empty lines are
908 ignored. Lines do have a length limit but this is not a serious
909 limitation as the format of the entries is fixed and checked by
910 gpgsm: A non-comment line starts with optional whitespace, fol‐
911 lowed by exactly 40 hex characters, white space and a lowercased
912 2 letter country code. Additional data delimited with by a
913 white space is current ignored but might late be used for other
914 purposes.
915 Note that even if a certificate is listed in this file, this
917 does not mean that the certificate is trusted; in general the
918 certificates listed in this file need to be listed also in
919 ‘trustlist.txt’.
920 This is a global file an installed in the data directory (e.g.
922 ‘/usr/share/gnupg/qualified.txt’). GnuPG installs a suitable
923 file with root certificates as used in Germany. As new Root-CA
924 certificates may be issued over time, these entries may need to
925 be updated; new distributions of this software should come with
926 an updated list but it is still the responsibility of the Admin‐
927 istrator to check that this list is correct.
928 Every time gpgsm uses a certificate for signing or verification
930 this file will be consulted to check whether the certificate
931 under question has ultimately been issued by one of these CAs.
932 If this is the case the user will be informed that the verified
933 signature represents a legally binding (``qualified'') signa‐
934 ture. When creating a signature using such a certificate an
935 extra prompt will be issued to let the user confirm that such a
936 legally binding signature shall really be created.
937 Because this software has not yet been approved for use with
939 such certificates, appropriate notices will be shown to indicate
940 this fact.
941 help.txt
944 This is plain text file with a few help entries used with pinen‐
945 try as well as a large list of help items for gpg and gpgsm.
946 The standard file has English help texts; to install localized
947 versions use filenames like ‘help.LL.txt’ with LL denoting the
948 locale. GnuPG comes with a set of predefined help files in the
949 data directory (e.g. ‘/usr/share/gnupg/gnupg/help.de.txt’) and
950 allows overriding of any help item by help files stored in the
951 system configuration directory (e.g. ‘/etc/gnupg/help.de.txt’).
952 For a reference of the help file's syntax, please see the
953 installed ‘help.txt’ file.
954 com-certs.pem
958 This file is a collection of common certificates used to popu‐
959 lated a newly created ‘pubring.kbx’. An administrator may
960 replace this file with a custom one. The format is a concatena‐
961 tion of PEM encoded X.509 certificates. This global file is
962 installed in the data directory (e.g. ‘/usr/share/gnupg/com-
963 certs.pem’).
964 Note that on larger installations, it is useful to put predefined files
967 into the directory ‘/etc/skel/.gnupg/’ so that newly created users
968 start up with a working configuration. For existing users a small
969 helper script is provided to create these files (see: [addgnupghome]).
970 For internal purposes gpgsm creates and maintains a few other files;
972 they all live in the current home directory (see: [option --homedir]).
973 Only gpgsm may modify these files.
974 pubring.kbx
978 This a database file storing the certificates as well as meta
979 information. For debugging purposes the tool kbxutil may be
980 used to show the internal structure of this file. You should
981 backup this file.
982 random_seed
985 This content of this file is used to maintain the internal state
986 of the random number generator across invocations. The same
987 file is used by other programs of this software too.
988 S.gpg-agent
991 If this file exists gpgsm will first try to connect to this
992 socket for accessing gpg-agent before starting a new gpg-agent
993 instance. Under Windows this socket (which in reality be a
994 plain file describing a regular TCP listening port) is the stan‐
995 dard way of connecting the gpg-agent.
996
999 gpg2(1), gpg-agent(1)
1000 The full documentation for this tool is maintained as a Texinfo manual.
1002 If GnuPG and the info program are properly installed at your site, the
1003 command
1004 info gnupg
1006 should give you access to the complete manual including a menu struc‐
1008 ture and an index.
1009GnuPG 2.2.18 2019-11-23 GPGSM(1)