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Customize Your JSSE Key and Trust Material Managers
by Anghel Leonard
There comes a day when you're required to write your first secure network application. When this happens, as a Java developer, you'll want to take a look at the JSSE API. This API provides an implementation of the SSL/TLS securing protocols. At first glance, you may not think that this API's default implementation will satisfy your applications' complex requirements, but fear not! This API allows you to customize its implementation to suit your needs. JSSE's customization facilities come in handy when you need to:
- Perform preferential validation of the certificates from a chain of certificates (you can manually validate a certificate that was automatically invalidate or manually invalidate a certificate that was automatically validate).
- Skip the validation process (validate all certificates) for testing other parts that don't imply the secure part.
- Choose the trust certificates to be used.
- Install and use more providers for getting factories of managers.
- Write a third-party application that acts as an administrator for your application.
Starting with a a simple client/server secure application, you'll become familiar with JSSE's implicit behavior and learn how to customize it for the example app. These examples should serve as a point base for your own applications.
Before you start, know that you must be familiar with the basic concepts of:
- SSL/TLS protocols
- X509 certificates
- Cipher-suites
- Keytool tool
Remember that any customization project depends on the larger context of the application. Therefore, this article presumes that you know how to build a simple J2SE application.
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