Hi, the UNIX/Linux password encoding mechanism is a derivation of DES, which uses a 56-bit encoding key (eight 7-bit characters). I.e. the crypt() function takes the user's password, pads it out to 8 (!) characters, and then uses 7 bits of each character to form a 56-bit DES key. This key is used to encrypt a 64-bit block of zeros, ... The final output is a string of 11 characters. A "salt" 2-character string is added to the first string. Thus, a complete encoded password entry consists of 13 characters. (see the second field in /etc/shadow) With Extended crypt the plaintext password can be longer than 8 characters; best regards willy -- Willy Luchian Paedagogische Hochschule ZIM - System- u. Netzadministration Bismarckstrasse 10; D-76133 Karlsruhe/Germany willy@ph-karlsruhe.de phone: +49-721-9254744 ********************************************************** Raffiniert ist der Herrgott, aber boshaft ist er nicht. A. Einstein **********************************************************