Summary
This document describes how to obtain and install the OpenSSL toolkit.
Background
The OpenSSL Project maintains an Open Source toolkit which implements the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL v2/v3) and Transport Layer Security (TLS v1) protocols and provides a general cryptography library.
The software is available for most platforms, including Linux, Macintosh, and Windows. It is also available in source form for compilation on most Unix systems.
Procedure
Microsoft Windows
OpenSSL binaries for Windows are available from the OpenSSL binaries page in an executable installer format. By default, the openssl tool is installed to C:\OpenSSL\bin and can be used from the command prompt (cmd.exe).
Macintosh OS X
OpenSSL is included in the default installation of OS X and can be accessed from the command line. You can access the command line using the Terminal application in the Utilities folder.
Linux
Most distributions include OpenSSL and many install it by default. You should use your preferred package manager to install the package. For example, on Debian you can use apt-get install openssl and on recent RedHat installations you can use yum install openssl. Alternatively, refer to the instructions below to build from source.
UNIX
Many UNIX distributions supply OpenSSL packages or make them available for download. Alternatively, you can obtain the source from the OpenSSL source page and build it as follows:
gunzip openssl-0.9.7g.tar.gz
tar xvf openssl-0.9.7g.tar
cd openssl-0.9.7g
sh ./config
make
make test
make install
More Information
For more information about OpenSSL, refer to the OpenSSL Web site.
As with any other security related package, OpenSSL should be kept up to date, especially when other software depends on it and issues can affect the security and stability of the entire system.
