Fedora Feature Proposal: Yum Integration

Horst H. von Brand vonbrand at inf.utfsm.cl
Thu Jul 19 15:51:34 UTC 2007


Matthew Miller <mattdm at mattdm.org> wrote:
> On Thu, Jul 19, 2007 at 09:50:33AM -0400, seth vidal wrote:
> > > system level software. That's useful -- but, as mentioned, kinda
> > > crack-ridden. (Partly, of course, because the distinction between user
> > > level and system level is very blurry.)
> > blurry? no it's completely non-existent. :)

> There's at least a whole lot of overlap. :)

Nope. If it has to be installed/configured/managed by root, it is system
software, regardless of it being the kernel or a game. The stuff in
$HOME is yours to mess around with.

To think otherwise is creating a whole new landscape of operating
system... and that can't be handled by just "OK, let's install <foo kind
of packages> by default under the control of Joe R. User", there has to
be a _lot_ more thought behind it.

> > This feels pretty scary. We'd constantly be moving the line to
> > accommodate varying levels of paranoia - and we'd have a big list we'd
> > have to keep current to make sure it wasn't outdated.

> Maybe just a simple list of white-listed packages, then. If this were done,
> I'd think the default Fedora config should be very very conservative (and,
> also, the entire feature off), but having that infrastructure there could be
> very helpful for controlled environments.

Exactly the other way around. In a controlled environment, you could
give the root password (or a suitably restricted sudo(1) entry) to
assorted users, or require users to contact the sysadmin to install
stuff. If you are thinking about the machines in a lab, the /very last/
thing you want is different configurations because on each machine a
random user, way back, ran some program with unusual flags, and didn't
note that this meant installing some gunk.

So this /can/ be handled locally (fully respecting the local level of
paranoia and configuration consistency requirements) right now with a
bit of work.
-- 
Dr. Horst H. von Brand                   User #22616 counter.li.org
Departamento de Informatica                    Fono: +56 32 2654431
Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria             +56 32 2654239
Casilla 110-V, Valparaiso, Chile               Fax:  +56 32 2797513




More information about the devel mailing list