Grand Unified Finite Field library*

Implements GF(2x) for various "natural" sizes such as 28, 216 and 232.

My goals for this crate are to:

1. help me learn to write good modules in Rust

2. help interested users learn about finite fields (ie, Galois fields)

3. provide a generic baseline implementation of basic maths (add, multiply, divide, etc.) over finite fields

4. explore various optimisations/adaptations (including table-based lookups and architecture-specific SIMD code) that can selectively override some/all of the default implementations (while remaining compatible with other implementations).

Also to:

5. provide some useful utility functions that go beyond just add, mul, div, etc. (eg, determining whether a field polynomial is primitive, or generating lookup tables for different kinds of optimisations)

See the top-level Readme for more information about the above.

Basic Use: doing maths in a particular field

As a user, the steps to take to use this library are:

• decide what "class" of field you want to use (GF(28), GF(216), etc.);

• decide if you want to use one of the optimised adaptations or are happy with the default, generic code;

• create a new field object (we can call f) of that class with your chosen field polynomial (aka "irreducible polynomial") by calling the appropriate constructor;

• use that object to do maths in that field: eg, result = f.mul(a,b)

Crate Name

* The crate name is deliberately hyperbolic:

Noun guff - unacceptable behavior (especially ludicrously false statements)