In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Paul Hovnanian P.E.
<paul@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote
on Thu, 10 Aug 2006 14:21:56 -0700
<44DBA374.768F266B@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>:
> The Ghost In The Machine wrote:
>>
>> In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Roy Schestowitz
>> <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> wrote
>> on Thu, 10 Aug 2006 16:04:37 +0100
>> <37272486.RsqZ0CMyUL@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:
>> > The short life and hard times of a Linux virus
>> >
>> > ,----[ Quote ]
>> > | For a Linux binary virus to infect executables, those executables must
>> > | be writable by the user activating the virus. That is not likely to be
>> > | the case. Chances are, the programs are owned by root and the user is
>> > | running from a non-privileged account. Further, the less experienced
>> > | the user, the lower the likelihood that he actually owns any
>> > | executable programs. Therefore, the users who are the least savvy about
>> > | such hazards are also the ones with the least fertile home directories
>> > | for viruses.
>> > |
>> > | [...]
>> > `----
>> >
>> > http://librenix.com/?inode=21
>>
>> I will note here that none of this is all that original;
>> UNIX(tm), for all of the trollish complaints about it being
>> "old technology", had and has similar defenses against
>> malware. In a way, that's a good thing. Linux isn't doing
>> anything really new here; we know it will work because
>> it's been working in most commercial Unixes for decades.
>
> So much for 'Linux is based on old technology'. Sometimes, the original
> is the best. Round wheels were first and they still work pretty well.
>
Indeed. And unless something peculiar happens (what, I
have no idea), it should continue to work reasonably well.
For its part Microsoft has a fair number of issues of "unintended
consequences". For instance, my understanding regarding Microsoft's
login sequence, which can probably be verified using a network sniffer,
is that a user's local profile is copied from either the domain
controller or a known remote drive into the user's local drive.
All several megabytes of it -- or was it several hundred??
No doubt the intent here was to make access faster (by
having it handily local), but what if the drive's nearly
full? Fragmentation issues also mount up. For its part
UNIX(tm) didn't bother; if a user's home directory was
on NFS, then it was on NFS, and the login system didn't
really *care*; it just executed the shell script(s) anyway.
Of course all that really does is distribute the problem
over the lifetime of the data access -- but if there's
enough RAM, NFS is more efficient, as one only gets what
one really needs, and then caches it.
CDE used to have an option to always save. I gave that "always save" up
after I lost my settings one too many times. One might notice that
Gnome shutdown has an option to save the settings, but it's not checked
by default. I think KDE has a similar option.
--
#191, ewill3@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Windows Vista. Because it's time to refresh your hardware. Trust us.
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