Why do i need prefix openssl with winpty on windows bash?

Question

Why do i need prefix openssl with winpty on windows bash?

Why does command

openssl genrsa -des3 -out ca.key 4096

hangs and doesn't respond

while

winpty openssl genrsa -des3 -out ca.key 4096

is working fine?

Solution 1

bash from Git for Windows uses mintty. mintty cannot present itself as console to openssl but winpty can because it does the required conversions. Learn the details at Git for Windows FAQ.

Solution 2

winpty is a Windows software package providing an interface similar to a Unix pty-master for communicating with Windows console programs. The package consists of a library (libwinpty) and a tool for Cygwin and MSYS for running Windows console programs in a Cygwin/MSYS pty

Because you try to run native openssl in not-native shell, you have to have interface of winpty

Comments

[Patlatus]

Could you please explain more? I didn't really get it

[Mingye Wang]

adding to the answer: winpty runs an actual windows console window in the background

[Mohammad Kholghi]

@Patlatus native OpenSSL can't be run in a not-native shell.

[Admin]

Thanks all! It might improve the answer to give some detailed description of a "native shell".