VB.NET

Get a Private Key's Raw Hex Value

Demonstrates the Chilkat PrivateKey.GetRawHex method, which returns the raw private value as lowercase hexadecimal and replaces the contents of the supplied StringBuilder with the corresponding raw public key.

Note: The file paths are relative to the application's current working directory. Absolute paths may also be used. Supply the paths appropriate to your own environment.

Background: This drops below the structured container formats to the bare key bytes as hex, which is meaningful chiefly for fixed-size keys such as EC and Ed25519 where a key is essentially a fixed byte string. It is the export to use when another system wants raw values rather than PEM or JWK — the counterpart to LoadEd25519. Both the returned private hex and the public value are produced in one call.

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Dim success As Boolean = False

'  Load a private key to export.
Dim privKey As New Chilkat.PrivateKey
success = privKey.LoadPemFile("qa_data/private.pem")
If (success = False) Then
    Debug.WriteLine(privKey.LastErrorText)
    Exit Sub
End If


'  GetRawHex returns the raw private value as lowercase hex, and replaces the contents of the
'  StringBuilder argument with the corresponding raw public key.  This is most meaningful for
'  fixed-size keys such as EC and Ed25519.
Dim sbPublic As New Chilkat.StringBuilder
Dim privHex As String = privKey.GetRawHex(sbPublic)
If (privKey.LastMethodSuccess = False) Then
    Debug.WriteLine(privKey.LastErrorText)
    Exit Sub
End If


Debug.WriteLine("Raw private value: " & privHex)
Debug.WriteLine("Raw public key: " & sbPublic.GetAsString())