Copyright © 1990-2025 Leon Poyyayil (private)
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BorderCastle JCE Provider
+ + A re-packaged version of the + BouncyCastle + JCE + provider with different package name for more deployment freedom. +
+ +Why in general?
++ Originally, this was an attempt at improving the situation on Android, + where the shipped embedded version of BouncyCastle was somewhat cut-down + and thus not suitable for various purposes. +
++ Apart from being crippled in certain regards, it was also difficult (if + not impossible) to use an updated version of BouncyCastle due to class + loader conflicts, because they would use identical class and package names. +
++ BorderCastle is the same as the stock BouncyCastle with a couple of + small changes and additions to allow for broader uses. +
+ +Why not SpongyCastle?
++ Why another fork apart from the already available + SpongyCastle? +
++ First of all, SpongyCastle doesn't appear to be maintained any longer + and thus it is not reflecting recent BouncyCastle versions. +
++ More importantly, as a manufacturer of software libraries and components, + it turned out to be important to allow flexible combination of our libraries + with other components, while not enforcing dependency version restrictions + on the users of our libraries. +
++ Hence, an application making use of our library could still make use of any + version of SpongyCastle or BouncyCastle without running into class loader + problems, while still guaranteeing the tested and well-defined environment + of our BorderCastle version. +
++ Of course, a lot of code duplication could be avoided by using the + BorderCastle classes everywhere - simply by renaming the imported packages. +
+ +Changes in respect to BouncyCastle
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- to avoid class loader conflicts, all packages have been renamed from + org.bouncycastle.* to org.bordercastle.* +
- the Java Security API Provider name is "BoCa" + rather than "BC" + (resp. "BoCaPQC" instead of "BCPQC" + for the post quantum provider) +
- no class name changes, so the BouncyCastleProvider class remains + Bouncy, not Border, + but moves to the org.bordercastle.jce.provider + package +
- added a simple class to allow for version checking without having + to instantiate a provider (which is an expensive operation): + org.bordercastle.Version +
- changed the names of the resulting built library files to have a + consistent naming pattern +
- added new constructors for the provider classes to allow instantiating + multiple ones with different names, so they can be used in parallel when needed +
Current version
++ The current version of BorderCastle is derived from the + BouncyCastle version 1.81. +
++ The BorderCastle JCE provider is signed with a special JCE code signing + certificate for JCE provider signing (issued by the "JCE Code Signing CA, + Oracle Corporation"). +
++ This allows the provider to be used for both, on Android and with "normal" + Java on desktop/server systems where the Oracle JRE requires JCE providers + to be signed. +
+ +License
++ BorderCastle is licensed under the same + adaptation + of the MIT X11 License as the original BouncyCastle library. +
+ +Downloads
++ Binary signed downloads can be found on the + Releases page. +
+ +Building
++ The + Wiki + describes the necessary steps for building. +
+ +Contributors
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- a great thanks to the original team from + BouncyCastle + for providing and maintaining this powerful piece of software! +
- Roberto Tyley + who came up with the initial idea of creating the Android port called SpongyCastle +
- Dario Incalza + who helped writing and extending the scripts for code re-organization +