openssl/openssl

Windows command line mangles unicode

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#17,453 opened on Jan 10, 2022

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branch: 3.0branch: 3.1branch: 3.2branch: masterhelp wantedtriaged: bug

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Description

My former colleague asked to bring up this issue. Unfortunately, I don't have Windows in my disposal now. Being build on windows using MinGW, both openssl 1.1.1m and 3.0.1 give an error

Command line:

openssl req -batch -newkey rsa -nodes -utf8 -keyout tmp.key -out tmp.req -subj /C=RU/L=Москва/CN=НеЗнаюЧТо

(the exact value of Russian letters don't really matter, it's important that they are Russian)

Error:

28120000:error:06800086:asn1 encoding routines:ASN1_mbstring_ncopy:invalid utf8string:crypto/asn1/a_mbstr.c:85:
req: Error adding subject name attribute "/L=╠юёътр"

The behavior does not change if we use chcp 866, both with command line invoked directly in cp866 or from a .bat file in UTF-8

Documentation says that, if -utf8 is specified, all strings should be encoded in UTF-8. Experiments show that it works well for the configuration file, but requires setting in cp866 via environment (for 3.0 series, 1.1.1 series is broken here).

Contributor guide

Research direction
Investigate how Windows command line passes arguments to programs, especially Unicode characters, and trace how OpenSSL's req command handles the utf8 flag and encoding of subject name components.
Tech stack
c
Domain
cli
Issue type
Bug
DifficultyEstimated implementation difficulty for a new contributor, from 1 for very small changes to 5 for expert-level work.
3
Estimated timeA rough time range for an experienced contributor to investigate, implement, test, and prepare a pull request.
1-3 hours
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Active
ClarityHow clearly the issue explains the expected change, acceptance criteria, and next step.
Clear
Prerequisites
CWindows
Newbie friendlinessA 1-100 score estimating how approachable this issue is for first-time contributors.
30