Assignment 2

1. The most difficult part of the reading for sections 1.1-1.2, 3.1-3.2 was definitely the two sections on number theory presented in chapter 3. Each section began rather innocuously with a seemingly easy introduction to the material. In section 3.1, for instance, it began by introducing what a divisor is and what division can be represented at, but quickly developed into the Euclidian algorithm involving prime numbers and the greatest common divisor. The theorems themselves were fairly straightforward but the proofs often required multiple reads. After a few reads, the information was fairly straightforward and the only barrier to easy understanding remained the notation. The notation q1 ^b1 * q12^b2 * qt^bt was written q1q1...q1q2...qt for instance, which was written without explanation.

2. The introductory chapter, chapter 1, was the most interesting and enjoyable primarily because it not only presented an overview of the basic goals and methods of cryptography and cryptanalysis, but also mentioned frequency analysis, a one-time pad cipher, and quantom cryptography, among others, that I had previously come in contact with when reading Simon Sighn's "The Code Book." The introductory text was also fairly informative in eplaining the mathematical limits and accomplishments feasible by computers and the resulting impact on cryptanalysis which presented a realistic view on these processes. I also enjoyed the reference to Eve's possible goals as being dependent upon the level of evil she possesses.