| Frequently asked questions |
| ========================== |
| |
| How does ``cryptography`` compare to NaCl (Networking and Cryptography Library)? |
| -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
| While ``cryptography`` and `NaCl`_ both share the goal of making cryptography |
| easier, and safer, to use for developers, ``cryptography`` is designed to be a |
| general purpose library, interoperable with existing systems, while NaCl |
| features a collection of hand selected algorithms. |
| |
| ``cryptography``'s :ref:`recipes <cryptography-layout>` layer has similar goals |
| to NaCl. |
| |
| If you prefer NaCl's design, we highly recommend `PyNaCl`_. |
| |
| When I try to use ``cryptography`` on Windows I get a ``cffi.ffiplatform.VerificationError`` |
| -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| |
| This error looks something like: |
| |
| .. code-block:: console |
| |
| cffi.ffiplatform.VerificationError: importing '<some_path>.pyd': DLL load failed: |
| |
| It typically occurs on Windows when you have not installed OpenSSL. Download |
| a `pre-compiled binary`_ to resolve this issue. |
| |
| .. _`NaCl`: http://nacl.cr.yp.to/ |
| .. _`PyNaCl`: https://pynacl.readthedocs.org |
| .. _`pre-compiled binary`: https://www.openssl.org/related/binaries.html |