Midterms 2 Study Quesitons, due on November 9

1. The midterm exam will be Monday and Tuesday, November 12 and 13, in the testing center, and will cover chapters 6, 7, 8, 9, and sections 3.4-3.10 and 3.12. For Friday November 9, as you study for the exam, write responses to some or all of the following questions.
• Which topics and ideas do you think are the most important out of those we have studied?  Factoring modulo n and finding squares modulo n are important because both of these help find each other and we can then use factoring to try and break RSA. Also, knowing the workings and attacks for RSA and discrete logarithms, like the ElGamal system, will be really important. 
• What kinds of questions do you expect to see on the exam? I expect to see a few shorter questions about the Chinese remainder theorem, Euler's theorem, Jacobi symbol calculations, ... and such math preliminary to understanding our major coding systems towards the beginning of the test. Then I expect questions about making and breaking RSA codes and discrete logarithm codes and variations of such in the second half of the test. Somewhere there will probably be a digital signature question and a primality test question too.
• What do you need to work on understanding better before the exam? I need to understand the continued fraction low exponent attack on RSA better and all the primality tests the most.