PublicKey

  • PublicKey is an interface that acts as a grouping mechanism for all public key interfaces, ensuring type safety.

  • It doesn't define any methods or constants of its own but is extended by specialized public key interfaces such as DSAPublicKey and RSAPublicKey.

  • PublicKey inherits methods from the Key interface for retrieving algorithm name, encoded key, and encoding format.

  • The serialVersionUID constant is used to maintain serialization compatibility across different versions of the class.

  • Some known indirect subclasses include DHPublicKey, DSAPublicKey, ECPublicKey, and RSAPublicKey, each providing specific functionalities for different cryptographic algorithms.

public interface PublicKey implements Key
Known Indirect Subclasses

A public key. This interface contains no methods or constants. It merely serves to group (and provide type safety for) all public key interfaces. Note: The specialized public key interfaces extend this interface. See, for example, the DSAPublicKey interface in java.security.interfaces.

Constant Summary

long serialVersionUID The class fingerprint that is set to indicate serialization compatibility with a previous version of the class.

Inherited Constant Summary

Inherited Method Summary

Constants

public static final long serialVersionUID

The class fingerprint that is set to indicate serialization compatibility with a previous version of the class.

Constant Value: 7187392471159151072