Show HN: Latchor – Tang-compatible NBDE server written in Elixir

1 point

9 months ago

Hi! I've been learning Elixir for a while and wanted to build something more challenging than the usual tutorial projects. Tang, the network-bound disk encryption (NBDE) server used with Clevis, caught my eye because the protocol is small, well-defined, and practical — but I couldn't find an implementation in Elixir. So I decided to write one.

It sticks closely to the Tang protocol, but I replaced the file‑based key storage with a SQLite‑backed design to make key rotation and cleanup safer. For the ECDH key exchange, I opted to call the same jose CLI Tang uses.

The repo includes a development log describing the design decisions, trade‑offs, and a few lessons learned from trying (and failing) to get an LLM to write code.

I believe this compatible implementation could also be useful as a reference for implementations in other programming languages.

FYI, I'm not a native English speaker, so please forgive any awkward phrasing.