[libssh2] userauth_publickey question

i'm a new perl Net::SSH2 user, and i am a bit confused regarding the public key authentication capabilities of the library. why does libssh2_userauth_publickey_fromfile() take both a private and a public key? in all my previous experience with ssh (the linux utility and Net::SSH::Perl, which closely mimics it), i simply provide the private key and deal with host key checking:

ssh -o IdentityFile=id_rsa user_at_ip

Can someone please explain why libssh2 requires both the public and private keys to authenticate a transaction? it strikes me as contrary to my (very limited) understanding of SSH. At the very least, it is less convenient than the other methods I have encountered.

Thanks for all your work! I am happy to have found this library, and I hope to use it extensively in my work.

George King

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Received on 2007-11-28