> OpenSSL could be more flexible or friendly in its building strategy. > But that could move into the "which directory" problem rather quickly. > This is kind of interesting. Looking at RFC 5280, section 4.2.1.1 Authority Key Identifier (p. 26): The value of the keyIdentifier field SHOULD be derived from the public key used to verify the certificate's signature or a method that generates unique values. So there's no requirement that the digest of the signer's public key be used in the subject's AKI. It looks like it could be a totally random value. The only requirement is that its unique. Now this is odd or at least counter-intuitive: the standard does not require that Authority Key Identifier in the subject certificate actually match the Subject Key Identifier in the signer. Its not stated and labeled MUST; in fact, it does not appear to be stated. I'm looking at sections 4.2.1.1 Authority Key Identifier and 4.2.1.2 Subject Key Identifier (maybe its stated elsewhere). If I am reading things correctly: I think that means OpenSSL is incorrect if its rejecting a valid path that could be constructed. I have to be careful how I say this since it depends on OpenSSL having the required certificates to construct the path (among other things). But a mismatched AKI is *not* a reason to reject. Jeff