As it is, the code is not very fast. Let's assume we have a secret of length _m_. For each byte, the splitting takes _n_ evaluations of a polynomial of order _k_ over Galois field 256, leading to _O(n\*k\*m)_ finite field multiplications. Reconstruction of the constant parameters during joining takes _O(k\*k + k\*m)_ multiplications.

Benchmark results, all values mean _seconds per byte_ of the secret length:

<table>

    <tr>

        <th>k / n parameters</th>

        <th>Split</th>

        <th>Join</th>

    </tr>

    <tr>

        <td>2 / 3 (a Raspberry Pi 3)</td>

        <td>0.000435</td>

    </tr>

    <tr>

        <td>2 / 3 (a laptop)</td>

        <td>7.17e-05</td>

    </tr>

    <tr>

        <td>254 / 254 (a Raspberry Pi 3)</td>

        <td>0.0314</td>

    </tr>

    <tr>

        <td>254 / 254 (a laptop)</td>

        <td>0.00347</td>

    </tr>

</table>

While the speeds are not awful, for longer secrets I recommend encrypting them with a random key of your choice and splitting only the key. Anyway, you can run your own benchmark with `shamira benchmark`

class SException(Exception): pass

class InvalidParams(SException): pass

class DetectionException(SException): pass

class DecodingException(SException): pass

class MalformedShare(SException): pass

def _share_byte(secret_b, k, n):

	if not k<=n<255:

		raise InvalidParams("Failed k<=n<255, k={0}, n={1}".format(k, n))

	# we might be concerned with zero coefficients degenerating our polynomial, but there's no reason - we still need k shares to determine it is the case

	points = [gf256.evaluate(coefs, i) for i in range(1, n+1)]

	return points

def generate_raw(secret, k, n):

	"""Splits secret into shares.

	:param secret: (bytes)

	:param k: number of shares necessary for secret recovery. 1 <= k <= n

	:param n: (int) number of shares generated. 1 <= n < 255

	:return: [(i, (bytes) share), ...]"""

	shares = [_share_byte(b, k, n) for b in secret]

def gfmul(a, b):

	"""Fast multiplication. Basic multiplication is expensive. a*b==g**(log(a)+log(b))"""

	assert 0<=a<=255, 0<=b<=255

	if a==0 or b==0: return 0

	t = L[a]+L[b]

	if t>255: t -= 255

	return E[t]

def evaluate(coefs, x):

	"""Evaluate polynomial's value at x.

	res = 0

	return res

def get_constant_coef(weights, y_coords):

	"""Compute constant polynomial coefficient given the points.

	See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shamir's_Secret_Sharing#Computationally_Efficient_Approach"""

	return reduce(

		operator.xor,

		map(lambda ab: gfmul(*ab), zip(weights, y_coords))

	)

			self.assertEqual(res[0], res[1])

			# underdetermined => random

			res = self.check_coefs_match(k, k-1)

			if res[0]==res[1]:

				random_matches += 1

		self.assertLess(random_matches, 2)  # with a chance (255/256)**10=0.96 there should be no match

	def check_coefs_match(self, k, m):

		coefs = [random.randint(0, 255) for i in range(k)]

		points = [(j, evaluate(coefs, j)) for j in range(1, 256)]

		random.shuffle(points)

	def test_generate_reconstruct_raw(self):

		for (k, n) in [(2, 3), (254, 254)]:

			shares = generate_raw(b"abcd", k, n)

			random.shuffle(shares)

			self.assertEqual(reconstruct_raw(*shares[:k]), b"abcd")

			self.assertNotEqual(reconstruct_raw(*shares[:k-1]), b"abcd")

	def test_generate_reconstruct(self):

		for secret in ["abcde", "ěščřžý"]:

			for (k, n) in [(2, 3), (254, 254)]:

				with self.subTest(sec=secret, k=k, n=n):

		self.assertEqual(_gfmul(0x53, 0xca), 0x01)

		self.assertEqual(_gfmul(0xff, 0xff), 0x13)

	def test_gfmul(self):

		for a in range(256):

			for b in range(256):

				self.assertEqual(_gfmul(a, b), gfmul(a, b))

	def test_evaluate(self):

		for x in range(256):

			(a0, a1, a2, a3) = (x, x>>1, x>>2, x>>3)

			self.assertEqual(evaluate([17], x), 17)  # constant polynomial

	def test_get_constant_coef(self):

		weights = compute_weights((1, 2, 3))

		ys = (1, 2, 3)

		self.assertEqual(get_constant_coef(weights, ys), 0)

		random.seed(17)

		random_matches = 0

		for i in range(10):

			k = random.randint(2, 255)

			# exact

			res = self.check_coefs_match(k, k-1)

			if res[0]==res[1]:

				random_matches += 1

		self.assertLess(random_matches, 2)  # with a chance (255/256)**10=0.96 there should be no match

	def check_coefs_match(self, k, m):

		coefs = [random.randint(0, 255) for i in range(k)]

		points = [(j, evaluate(coefs, j)) for j in range(1, 256)]

		random.shuffle(points)

		(xs, ys) = zip(*points[:m])

		weights = compute_weights(xs)

if __name__=='__main__':

	unittest.main()