NAME

sekrets.rb

SYNOPSIS

sekrets is a command line tool and library used to securely manage encrypted
files and settings in your rails' applications and git repositories.

INSTALL

gem install sekrets
gem 'sekrets'

DESCRIPTION

TL;DR
  # create an encrypted config file

    ruby -r yaml -e'puts({:api_key => 1234}.to_yaml)' | sekrets write config/settings.yml.enc --key 42

  # display it

    sekrets read config/settings.yml.enc --key 42

  # edit it

    sekrets edit config/settings.yml.enc --key 42

  # see that it's encrypted

    cat config/settings.yml.enc

  # commit it

    git add config/settings.yml.enc

  # put the decryption key in a file

    echo 42 > .sekrets.key

  # ignore this file in git

    echo .sekrets.key >> .gitignore

  # you now no longer need to provide the --key argument to commands

    sekrets read config/settings.yml.enc

    sekrets edit config/settings.yml.enc

  # make sure this file gets deployed on your server

    echo " require 'sekrets/capistrano' " >> Capfile

  # commit and deploy

    git add config/settings.yml.enc
    git commit -am'encrypted settings yo'
    git pull && git push && cap staging deploy

  # access these settings in your application code

    settings = Sekrets.settings_for('./config/settings.yml.enc')

RAILS
  gem 'sekrets' # Gemfile

  bundle install

  rake sekrets:generate:key
  rake sekrets:generate:editor
  rake sekrets:generate:config

DESCRIPTION
  sekrets provides commandline tools and a library to manage and access
  encrypted files in your code base.

  it allows one to check encrypted infomation into a repository and to manage
  it alongside the rest of the code base.  it elimnates the need to check in
  unencrypted information, keys, or other sensitive infomation.

  sekrets provides both a general mechanism for managing arbitrary encrypted
  files and a specific mechanism for managing encrypted config files.

KEY LOOKUP
  for *all* operations, from the command line or otherwise, sekrets uses the
  following algorithm to search for a decryption key:

  - any key passed directly as a parameter to a library call will be preferred

  - otherwise the code looks for a companion key file.  for example, given the
    file 'config/sekrets.yml.enc' sekrets will look for a key at

      config/.sekrets.yml.enc.key

    if either of these is found to be non-empty the contents of the file will
    be used as the decryption key for that file.  you should *never* commit
    these key files and also add them to your .gitignore - or similar.

  - next a project key file is looked for.  the path of this file is

      ./.sekrets.key

    normally and, in a rails' application

      RAILS_ROOT/.sekrets.key

  - if that is not found sekrets looks for the key in the environment under
    the env var

      SEKRETS_KEY

    the env var used is configurable in the library

  - next the global key file is search for, the path of this file is

      ~/.sekrets.key

  - finally, if no key has yet been specified or found, the user is prompted
    to input the key.  prompt only occurs if the user us attached to a tty.
    so, for example, no prompt will hang and application being started in the
    background such as a rails' application being managed by passenger.

  see Sekrets.key_for for more details

KEY DISTRIBUTION
  sekrets does *not* attempt to solve the key distribution problem for you,
  with one exception:

  if you are using capistrano to do a 'vanilla' ssh based deploy a simple
  recipe is provided which will detect a local keyfile and scp it onto the
  remote server(s) on deploy.

  sekrets assumes that the local keyfile, if it exists, is correct.

  in plain english the capistrano recipe does:

    scp ./sekrets.key deploy@remote.host.com:/rails_root/current/sekrets.key

  it goes without saying that the local keyfile should *never* be checked in
  and also should be in .gitignore

  distribution of this key among developers is outside the scope of the
  library.  encrypted email is likely the best mechanism for distribution,
  but you've still got to sovle this problem for yourself ;-/