Re: bringing /etc/services up to date

From: Brooks Davis <brooks_at_one-eyed-alien.net>
Date: Wed, 7 Jul 2004 11:47:42 -0700
On Wed, Jul 07, 2004 at 01:36:31PM -0500, Matthew D. Fuller wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 07, 2004 at 11:30:54AM -0700 I heard the voice of
> Brooks Davis, and lo! it spake thus:
> > 
> > IMO, programs that read the flatfile will get what they deserve.
> 
> You won't get any argument from *ME* on that.  But there ARE still
> programs (that do "get what they deserve", but it's still annoying)
> that parse /etc/passwd manually instead of using getpw*() or PAM, too.
> Chances are, there are programs being written right now that do that,
> either through ignorance, or "for security", or just for sheer
> cussedness.
> 
> That's not to say it's a showstopper that should paralyze any future
> work.  But it's also not entirely a handwave "who cares?"  Like most
> interesting things in life, it's an irritating middle ground.

Given that a) nothing will break [0] and b) a quick vi session will fix
the "problem", I'm not worried.  I am worried about what happens to the
performance of applications that do use the API properly.  If their
performance degrades significantly, that needs to be fixed before this
code is brought in.

-- Brooks

[0] I suppose a deeply emdeded device with next no free memory using a
really stupid parser could break, but if that case, where did they find
the storage for the services file?

-- 
Any statement of the form "X is the one, true Y" is FALSE.
PGP fingerprint 655D 519C 26A7 82E7 2529  9BF0 5D8E 8BE9 F238 1AD4

Received on Wed Jul 07 2004 - 16:47:44 UTC

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