Getting people to say nice things about Microsoft (Linspire repo)

[Matthew Saltzman]

On Thu, 25 Jan 2007, David Boles wrote:

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> Matthew Saltzman wrote:
>> On Thu, 25 Jan 2007, Les Mikesell wrote:
>>
>>> Craig White wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Would know if Freespire has the same security flaw that Linspire has?
>>>>> Everything by design in Linspire is run as 'root'. The GUI desktop. The
>>>>> applications. The whole thing. Just like Windows does.
>>>> ----
>>>> Like Ric & Gene
>>>
>>> On a single-user computer there's not a whole lot of value in
>>> preventing yourself from being able to destroy other user's
>>> work - which is what you get from the effort of not having
>>> admin privilages all the time.
>>
>> Also some protection from accidentally destroying the rest of your
>> system, which seems a worthwhile tradeoff to me.
>>
>>>
>>> Also, if you really think there are security bugs lurking in the
>>> programs you are running, wouldn't you prefer that they be
>>> found and fixed instead of worked around, avoided, and allowed
>>> to linger forever?
>>
>> Well, sure, but I'm not volunteering to be the victim in the meantime.
>
> Matthew,
>
> I really doubt that you will win an argument about 'run as root' security
> here. It sounds as though many have SElinux turned off because it is
> inconvenient sometimes when it denies disk/file access that might be harmful,
> as Windows does allow, to strange applications. Some even think SELinux is a
> 'spy thing' from the NSA all because of a supposed Windows problem mentioned
> in the news dated 1999. One that had nothing to do with SELinux.

Yeah, I know.  I usually try to sit on my hands when these things come up, 
but I slipped off.

>
> And while they are looking in the closet and under the bed for the bogeyman he
> could be walking in the front door through an unlocked door.  ;-)

-- 
 		Matthew Saltzman

Clemson University Math Sciences
mjs AT clemson DOT edu
http://www.math.clemson.edu/~mjs