Thanks for a good explanation, but it invites some questions...
"
hownowbrowncow" seems like it would be a simple target for a dictionary attack, but "
how now brown cow" appears to throw a monkey wrench at the attack, with "
how*now*brown*cow" compounding it and "
how**now**brown**cow" further compounding it.
And "
how**now**brown**cow**how**now**brown**cow" is an easily remembered string that seems like it would be a great password simply by virtue of its 42 character length.
The possibility of repeating strings to turn easily remembered ones into secure passwords has never been addressed, and I'm wondering whether it's as viable an approach as it appears to be?
In the end, a permutation run will eventually crack any password, and unless there's some math or attack theory that I've never run across or been run over by, any string, even a single character repeated enough times
is may be a secure password.
And now you know why I didn't do very well with the statistics and probability courses I took.
