Learning how to use the API for OpenSSL -- the best-known open library for secure communication -- can be intimidating, because the documentation is incomplete. Fill in the gaps, and tame the API, with the tips in this article. After setting up a basic connection, see how to use OpenSSL's BIO library to set up both a secured and unsecured connection. And learn a bit about error detection as well.

The documentation to the OpenSSL API is a little vague. Not many tutorials on the use of OpenSSL exist either, so getting it to work in applications can be a little troublesome for beginners. So how can you implement a basic secure connection using OpenSSL? This guide will help to solve that problem.

Part of the problem with learning how to implement OpenSSL is the fact that the documentation is not complete. An incomplete API documentation normally keeps developers from using the API, which normally spells doom for it. Yet OpenSSL is still around and going strong. Why?

By Kenneth Ballard at IBM developerWorks.

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