OBJ_nid2obj(3)			    OpenSSL			OBJ_nid2obj(3)

NAME
       OBJ_nid2obj, OBJ_nid2ln, OBJ_nid2sn, OBJ_obj2nid, OBJ_txt2nid,
       OBJ_ln2nid, OBJ_sn2nid, OBJ_cmp, OBJ_dup, OBJ_txt2obj, OBJ_obj2txt,
       OBJ_create, OBJ_cleanup - ASN1 object utility functions

SYNOPSIS
	ASN1_OBJECT * OBJ_nid2obj(int n);
	const char *  OBJ_nid2ln(int n);
	const char *  OBJ_nid2sn(int n);

	int OBJ_obj2nid(const ASN1_OBJECT *o);
	int OBJ_ln2nid(const char *ln);
	int OBJ_sn2nid(const char *sn);

	int OBJ_txt2nid(const char *s);

	ASN1_OBJECT * OBJ_txt2obj(const char *s, int no_name);
	int OBJ_obj2txt(char *buf, int buf_len, const ASN1_OBJECT *a, int no_name);

	int OBJ_cmp(const ASN1_OBJECT *a,const ASN1_OBJECT *b);
	ASN1_OBJECT * OBJ_dup(const ASN1_OBJECT *o);

	int OBJ_create(const char *oid,const char *sn,const char *ln);
	void OBJ_cleanup(void);

DESCRIPTION
       The ASN1 object utility functions process ASN1_OBJECT structures which
       are a representation of the ASN1 OBJECT IDENTIFIER (OID) type.

       OBJ_nid2obj(), OBJ_nid2ln() and OBJ_nid2sn() convert the NID n to an
       ASN1_OBJECT structure, its long name and its short name respectively,
       or NULL is an error occurred.

       OBJ_obj2nid(), OBJ_ln2nid(), OBJ_sn2nid() return the corresponding NID
       for the object o, the long name <ln> or the short name <sn>
       respectively or NID_undef if an error occurred.

       OBJ_txt2nid() returns NID corresponding to text string <s>. s can be a
       long name, a short name or the numerical respresentation of an object.

       OBJ_txt2obj() converts the text string s into an ASN1_OBJECT structure.
       If no_name is 0 then long names and short names will be interpreted as
       well as numerical forms. If no_name is 1 only the numerical form is
       acceptable.

       OBJ_obj2txt() converts the ASN1_OBJECT a into a textual representation.
       The representation is written as a null terminated string to buf at
       most buf_len bytes are written, truncating the result if necessary.
       The total amount of space required is returned. If no_name is 0 then if
       the object has a long or short name then that will be used, otherwise
       the numerical form will be used. If no_name is 1 then the numerical
       form will always be used.

       OBJ_cmp() compares a to b. If the two are identical 0 is returned.

       OBJ_dup() returns a copy of o.

       OBJ_create() adds a new object to the internal table. oid is the
       numerical form of the object, sn the short name and ln the long name. A
       new NID is returned for the created object.

       OBJ_cleanup() cleans up OpenSSLs internal object table: this should be
       called before an application exits if any new objects were added using
       OBJ_create().

NOTES
       Objects in OpenSSL can have a short name, a long name and a numerical
       identifier (NID) associated with them. A standard set of objects is
       represented in an internal table. The appropriate values are defined in
       the header file objects.h.

       For example the OID for commonName has the following definitions:

	#define SN_commonName			"CN"
	#define LN_commonName			"commonName"
	#define NID_commonName			13

       New objects can be added by calling OBJ_create().

       Table objects have certain advantages over other objects: for example
       their NIDs can be used in a C language switch statement. They are also
       static constant structures which are shared: that is there is only a
       single constant structure for each table object.

       Objects which are not in the table have the NID value NID_undef.

       Objects do not need to be in the internal tables to be processed, the
       functions OBJ_txt2obj() and OBJ_obj2txt() can process the numerical
       form of an OID.

EXAMPLES
       Create an object for commonName:

	ASN1_OBJECT *o;
	o = OBJ_nid2obj(NID_commonName);

       Check if an object is commonName

	if (OBJ_obj2nid(obj) == NID_commonName)
	       /* Do something */

       Create a new NID and initialize an object from it:

	int new_nid;
	ASN1_OBJECT *obj;
	new_nid = OBJ_create("1.2.3.4", "NewOID", "New Object Identifier");

	obj = OBJ_nid2obj(new_nid);

       Create a new object directly:

	obj = OBJ_txt2obj("1.2.3.4", 1);

BUGS
       OBJ_obj2txt() is awkward and messy to use: it doesn't follow the
       convention of other OpenSSL functions where the buffer can be set to
       NULL to determine the amount of data that should be written.  Instead
       buf must point to a valid buffer and buf_len should be set to a
       positive value. A buffer length of 80 should be more than enough to
       handle any OID encountered in practice.

RETURN VALUES
       OBJ_nid2obj() returns an ASN1_OBJECT structure or NULL is an error
       occurred.

       OBJ_nid2ln() and OBJ_nid2sn() returns a valid string or NULL on error.

       OBJ_obj2nid(), OBJ_ln2nid(), OBJ_sn2nid() and OBJ_txt2nid() return a
       NID or NID_undef on error.

SEE ALSO
       ERR_get_error(3)

HISTORY
       TBA

0.9.8j				  2002-10-20			OBJ_nid2obj(3)

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