From 018847143cbaa526bc64556fc7c9dc34a151050b Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Romain Edelmann Date: Fri, 9 Aug 2013 20:33:27 +0200 Subject: [PATCH] Improved README. --- README.md | 22 ++++++++++++---------- 1 file changed, 12 insertions(+), 10 deletions(-) diff --git a/README.md b/README.md index 2373b21..41c8982 100644 --- a/README.md +++ b/README.md @@ -1,21 +1,23 @@ # scat -`scat` is a password *scat*terer. It allows the generation of unique passwords for each service, such as -website, email address or desktop account, from a single password. +`scat` is a *password scatterer*. It allows the generation of unique passwords for each service, +website, email address or account you might have, all from a single password. ## Motivation Nowadays, accounts for many services such as Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Google, Amazon, your bank account, etc. are needed. In a perfect world, all those accounts would have different passwords, so that, if someone gets to know, let's say, your Facebook password, -they don't gain access to your bank account and your money. But, on the other hand, who would like to remember dozens and dozens of passwords? +they don't gain access to your bank account and your money as well. But, on the other hand, who would like to remember dozens and dozens of different passwords? -`scat` is the solution to this problem. It allows you to safely generate for each website a unique password from a single known password. -If by misfortune one of the generated password is compromised, all other passwords are still safe. +`scat` is the solution to this problem. It allows you to safely generate for each website or service you suscribe to a unique password. All you have to do is remember a single, as strong as possible, password. + +Given the same service and password, `scat` will always generate the same password, so you don't have to remember them or note them down! +Passwords generated by `scat` are very secure and independant of each others. If by misfortune one of the generated password is compromised, all other passwords are still safe, and so is the password you used to generate them. ## Example -To use `scat`, simply call it specifying for which key, or service, it must generate a password. +To use `scat`, simply call it specifying which key, or service, it must generate a password for. Then, simply enter your password (which is, in this example, `pony1234`): ``` @@ -36,9 +38,9 @@ Generated password: 6yorHvhrpj#8Yce:bl ``` -Imagine now that your are on an other computer, with no access to your keychain, and you would like to login to facebook (just for 5 minutes!). +Imagine now that your are on an other computer, with no access to your keychain, and you would like to login to Facebook (just for 5 minutes). To your great despair, there is no way you can remember your obscure password! -However, as `scat` is fully deterministic, you can simply call it once more, to generate once again the exact same password. +However, as `scat` is fully deterministic, you can simply call it once more, to generate once again the exact same password, this time from another computer. ``` > scat -c -k "facebook" @@ -65,8 +67,8 @@ Knowing a single generated password won't help your attacker much, it is still p As we have just seen, `scat` generates by default password of length 18. But, it also provides other schemas! -If you want, for some reason, an easily rememberable passphrase, for let's say facebook, you can use the schema named `diceware`, -which will output 5 words out of a list of 7776 words, as provided by [The Diceware Passphrase Home Page][diceware]. +If you want, for some reason, an easily rememberable passphrase, for let's say Facebook, you can use the schema named `diceware`, +which will output 5 words out of the 7776 words of [the Diceware list][diceware]. ``` > scat -c -k "facebook" -s diceware