Future and impact of ongoing projects in Linux world

[Xen]

Ralf Mardorf schreef op 11-10-2016 21:16:

> "These are all practically unused options."

And they are. I have never come across a single file that had the 
immutable bit set or I would have found out.

If the graphical tools don't support it it won't be much use unless 
automated system installs use it. Am I to immutibalize all of the files 
I don't want to be corrupted? Can apt work with that? This is not 
something a user can do on his own (or her own).

I don't deny that the thing would be useful, in fact it sparks my 
interest. Besides, what was the topic. Oh yes, ensuring that you don't 
make drastic errors by mistake. And the reason for that was saying that 
the user is not protected from destroying his system.

And the reason for that was saying that root access is /easy/ but 
convenience still is not!! Tough is it, when someone can draw the 
discussion back to where it started? And the reason for not saying that 
the user cannot protect itself is not that it would be easy for him to 
do so regardless. It is because people like you think it is easy and it 
is not. What I mean is that you won't refuse to acknowledge that this 
isn't working. If you actually knew what you were talking about.

> If a user is not willing to use the provided tools, than the better OS
> for such a user is a restricted OS.

You say the user is protected, but now you go to great lengths to say 
that the user must go to great lengths to protect himself. So the user 
must obtain root (in a default install of Ubuntu, for example) and then 
go to great length making the entirety of the filesystem immutable, 
probably fucking up every other tool out there.

> Using Linux requires some amount of
> self-responsibility and a minimum of interest in learning how to use
> it.

So what would happen to *your* system if you did "sudo rm -rf /*"?

It is pretty clear -I is as dysfynctional as it can get: it prompts you 
whenever MORE THAN 3 FILES are getting deleted, and won't allow you to 
differentiate between that, and directories! That is the stupidest thing 
to do, and that designer probably didn't think much about it. Instead of 
making a /good/ default and using that as the default (requiring e.g. 
some --force to override) the default is that -f (that most people use) 
HAS NO GOOD USE OTHER THAN not telling you that you didn't just delete 
nothing, you actually deleted nothing. It just won't tell you if a file 
is missing, that is all it does.

rm -rf  <-- the f is useless for the most part
rm -I   <-- will prompt on more than 3 files
rm -rI  <-- will prompt on more than 3 files, and directories.

When you hit rm -rI * it will only tell you the number of files in the 
directory, it will not give you their names, or the total amount of 
files you are going to delete, so it is just very much useless.

It is a useless question and unless you pay specific attention you will 
force yourself to type "y <enter>" based on nothing more than a 
/number/. Which will quickly become a repetitive thing rendering the -I 
question pointless because you will be too fast at pressing "y <enter>" 
anyway for it to be of any use.

This thing has no intelligence and I would not recommend using it. I 
very much doubt anyone does.

> For using Linux there's no need to become a geek, but Linux is not a
> replacement for a restricted OS, for completely clueless users, without
> any interest in leraning how to use it.

You speak of Immutable bits and -I flags and then you say we do not need 
to become a geek. What are you then?

Have you any clue what it does to a person when you tell him to use 
those options?

> We needed to learn how to use
> forks and knives and for a much more complex tool, the computer, some
> people are not willing to spend at least the same amount of time and
> effort as they spend in learning how to use forks and knives.

You are comparing using a fork to recursively setting an Immutable flag 
that you don't want to be deleted that will have to be removed prior to 
using a tool like Apt /juust/ because "rm" does not by default provide 
any sense of useful protection and you call that "not geek stuff". Have 
you any common sense left in you?

I think you have been in Arch for too long man, it's rotting your brain.

> No restricted OS provides that amount of choice as Linux does. To make
> it easy for clueless users, some distros, e.g. Ubuntu, provide some
> defaults.

Could you please get off your high horse and venture among people once 
more?

No Ubuntu system has Immutable flags anywhere. This is the default and 
what all users will see.

No one uses a tool like rm -I when it is practically pointless to do so.

For some reason "rm -rf" is the only practical choice and everyone uses 
it, as if it has some magic to it, that "rm -r" does not (the -f 
practically serves no purpose, but it is more 'rhythmically correct' to 
write rm -rf instead of rm -r.

The -f should mean "force" but instead it means "Just don't tell me if 
you haven't done anything actually."

It never actually overrides any prompts that I know of.

You are arguing that Ubuntu users must grow up and become Arch users, 
prior to being expected, or prior to be allowed to expect, a reasonably 
functional system.

I was saying about the practical reality NOW that NO USER is protected 
the way you say he/she is and that ALL of those users have access to 
sudo, and that ANY hacking tool can get access to their password AND su 
rights. I was saying that the security of this default Linux system is a 
joke, there is no security to it at all, and they would be just as prone 
to viruses and anything else as any Windows user, save for the fact that 
you normally don't install free wild third party packages, which is a 
measure of protection, but not much.

Any browser exploit could give anyone root access.

Unless of course perhaps something like AppArmor would prevent it. I 
mean, I stand corrected in that case, I guess.

But I find very few profiles and I just don't trust it all that much. 
Maybe the browsers have protection against that. I wouldn't trust it to 
be sure. I think Linux would be just as vulnerable as Windows if it 
really was targetted, apart from the fact that Linux can easily 
introduce a package verification system that runs site wide and just 
reports corrupted files.

But the point of what I was saying is simply that destroying your system 
is very easy and you are not protected from that and many users are dead 
afraid of doing anything to it for fear of making a mistake and the 
command line itself is just very risky. And even though all of this is 
that easy to do, we still cannot do certain things that would not even 
require root privileges. I venture that gvfs goes a long way to solving 
this but it is actually the wrong solution in the wrong spot.

If it is only accepted by Gnome distributions.

The point was simply: root access is easy for UID 1000 user
* Destroying system is easy for default system
* Command line shell is hard, to know where you are, to never mistype, 
etc.
* There are no good default protections that need overrides
* Injunctions against users to "stay away from root" probably.
* Wrong rm deletes a file, Linux filesystems do not support undeletion.
* Wrong fstab --> system doesn't boot
* Errors are easy to make and can render complete system unbootable 
within seconds.
* My own system fails to boot at least once a month due to errors or 
automatic upgrades (errors on my behalf, and automatic updates that mess 
with it).
* It is very easy to break a Linux system -- I can probably give you 
plenty of ways to do it, let's get creative!!

* I hope I'm allowed to poke fun at stuff --> in reference to 
https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2012/11/msg01002.html (in which I 
think you made very valid points).

* Let's a create a "ways to kill Ubuntu" site where we introduce a list 
of small configuration changes that will render the entire system 
unbootable ;-). Just to put a little humour into the thing.







> 
> I can't remember that I ever read such complaints as your, on the 
> Ubuntu
> user list, https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-users/ .

You are not a developer, so you cannot understand a developer question. 
You think it is a user support question. It is not. It is a developer 
question.

I have been banned at ubuntu-users for poking fun at Ralf Mardorf in a 
previous life.

Also, maybe there are issues with:
* your remembering
* your reading
* your knowing what things are complaints
* your thinking I am an Ubuntu user :P.

But beside that point, if you cannot watch a video (or do not wish to do 
so) there is nothing further I can say.

Here it is again:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksYSMZTG4JU

It seems ridiculous without the context. It is 16 seconds long (can 
almost go on Instagram).


> I also do not understand, why a user who is satisfied with Windows,
> should use Linux and vice versa.

Where did I say where I was satisfied with Windows?

Should we be *more* satisfied when our system can do *less*? Do you mean 
that the lack of ability to do stuff in Linux should lead to 
satisfaction? I hope I have you wrong there. I hope being forced to 
enter the shell and the command line to do anything and work very hard 
at accomplishing anything, should not be a satisfying thing.

I hope that a lack of satisfaction with Windows is reason enough for you 
to be in Linux (for me) but I do not get why I should be satisfied with 
an *in*ability to do stuff.