«

http://www.informationweek.com/windo...leID=185303839

"The snafu involving one of Microsoft's recent security patches continued
to grow as the developer acknowledged new incompatibility problems with
some video drivers and users on the company's forums complained about
having to uninstall the fix or resort to unsanctioned repairs."


Have A Nice Cup of Tea

--
Andreas Girardet: "In Suse, there are about 15,000 to 20,000
developers working on the project, and internally at Novell
we have about 1,000 developers devoted just to Suse."

Yep - I reckon this was the issue with my new PC locking up and shutting
down. I've uninstalled it, and things seem to be sweet!
Grr..

"Have A Nice Cup of Tea" <> wrote in message
news...
> http://www.informationweek.com/windo...leID=185303839
>
> "The snafu involving one of Microsoft's recent security patches continued
> to grow as the developer acknowledged new incompatibility problems with
> some video drivers and users on the company's forums complained about
> having to uninstall the fix or resort to unsanctioned repairs."
>
>
> Have A Nice Cup of Tea
>
> --
> Andreas Girardet: "In Suse, there are about 15,000 to 20,000
> developers working on the project, and internally at Novell
> we have about 1,000 developers devoted just to Suse."
>

"Have A Nice Cup of Tea" <> wrote in message
news...
> http://www.informationweek.com/windo...leID=185303839
>
> "The snafu involving one of Microsoft's recent security patches continued
> to grow as the developer acknowledged new incompatibility problems with
> some video drivers and users on the company's forums complained about
> having to uninstall the fix or resort to unsanctioned repairs."
>
>

On other news, a multiplatform virus won't propagate on Linux installation
because of bug in Kernel
(http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl...4/18/2046203):

"Newsforge is reporting that Linus Torvalds took a few minutes to review the
cross-platform proof of concept virus covered yesterday and has proven that
the virus does indeed not work with latest kernel version 2.6.16 and even
released a patch in order to fix this "problem." From the article: "The
reason that the virus is not propagating itself in the latest kernel
versions is due to a bug in how GCC handles specific registers in a
particular system call. [...] So the virus did a number of strange things to
make this show up, but on the other hand the kernel does try to avoid
touching user registers, even if we've never really _guaranteed_ that. So
the 2.6.16 effect is a mis-feature, even if a _normal_ app would never care.
It just happened to bite the infection logic of your virus thing." "

My point is that there's no perfect OS, because they are all developed by
not-so-perfect-humans.

--

Mauricio Freitas
www.geekzone.co.nz, www.geekzone.co.nz/freitasm,
www.geekzone.co.nz/geekzoneblog.asp
Software for Pocket PC: www.geekzone.co.nz/store
Microsoft MVP Mobile Devices

On Wed, 19 Apr 2006 16:56:46 +1200, Mauricio Freitas [MVP] wrote:

> My point is that there's no perfect OS, because they are all developed by
> not-so-perfect-humans.

Perfection is something attained when people will not accept less than
excellence.

If you aim for mediocrity then you will never have excellence!

If you start out with the premise that you shall never have perfection
then you will never be disappointed.


Have A Nice Cup of Tea

--
Andreas Girardet: "In Suse, there are about 15,000 to 20,000
developers working on the project, and internally at Novell
we have about 1,000 developers devoted just to Suse."

Have A Nice Cup of Tea wrote:

> On Wed, 19 Apr 2006 16:56:46 +1200, Mauricio Freitas [MVP] wrote:
>
>> My point is that there's no perfect OS, because they are all developed by
>> not-so-perfect-humans.
>
> Perfection is something attained when people will not accept less than
> excellence.
>
> If you aim for mediocrity then you will never have excellence!
>
> If you start out with the premise that you shall never have perfection
> then you will never be disappointed.
>
>
> Have A Nice Cup of Tea
>

Have you ever made a program yourself?
*ever*

--
Rule 6: There is no Rule 6.

Brendon wrote:
> Yep - I reckon this was the issue with my new PC locking up and
> shutting down. I've uninstalled it, and things seem to be sweet!
> Grr..

Oh well, software problems are often easier to fix than hardware. At least
it got you to fix up that mess of goop you had between your CPU and HS. (I
hope).

Cheers,
--
~Shaun~

> "Have A Nice Cup of Tea" <> wrote in message
> news...
>> http://www.informationweek.com/windo...leID=185303839
>>
>> "The snafu involving one of Microsoft's recent security patches
>> continued to grow as the developer acknowledged new incompatibility
>> problems with some video drivers and users on the company's forums
>> complained about having to uninstall the fix or resort to
>> unsanctioned repairs." Have A Nice Cup of Tea
>>
>> --
>> Andreas Girardet: "In Suse, there are about 15,000 to 20,000
>> developers working on the project, and internally at Novell
>> we have about 1,000 developers devoted just to Suse."

Mauricio Freitas [MVP] wrote:
> "Have A Nice Cup of Tea" <> wrote in message
> news...
>
>>http://www.informationweek.com/windo...leID=185303839
>>
>>"The snafu involving one of Microsoft's recent security patches continued
>>to grow as the developer acknowledged new incompatibility problems with
>>some video drivers and users on the company's forums complained about
>>having to uninstall the fix or resort to unsanctioned repairs."
>>
>>
>
>
> On other news, a multiplatform virus won't propagate on Linux installation
> because of bug in Kernel
> (http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl...4/18/2046203):
>
> "Newsforge is reporting that Linus Torvalds took a few minutes to review the
> cross-platform proof of concept virus covered yesterday and has proven that
> the virus does indeed not work with latest kernel version 2.6.16 and even
> released a patch in order to fix this "problem." From the article: "The
> reason that the virus is not propagating itself in the latest kernel
> versions is due to a bug in how GCC handles specific registers in a
> particular system call. [...] So the virus did a number of strange things to
> make this show up, but on the other hand the kernel does try to avoid
> touching user registers, even if we've never really _guaranteed_ that. So
> the 2.6.16 effect is a mis-feature, even if a _normal_ app would never care.
> It just happened to bite the infection logic of your virus thing." "
>
> My point is that there's no perfect OS, because they are all developed by
> not-so-perfect-humans.
>

So the so called proof of concept, note Proof of Concept, not out there
in the wild, now just about works.

Shows Linus's contempt for this virus by fixing it....LOL.....how many
actual wild windows viruses are there? 4000? 8000? 30,000?

Various other anti-virus companies have over the years "demonstrated"
Linux proof of concept viruses, and they have remained just that,
oddities in the lab.

Lets face it, even with only a small amount of Linux desktops out there,
whoever writes the first cross platform virus that infects a Linux box
as well as a Windows one will be (in)famous...

So I would think that black hats will of tried, and based on this proof
of concept I am sure they will try even more.....

While I agree no OS is perfect, certain aspects of Linux shine over
Windows, virus issues being one of them.....

regards

thing

thingy wrote:

> Mauricio Freitas [MVP] wrote:
>> "Have A Nice Cup of Tea" <> wrote in message
>> news...
>>
>>>http://www.informationweek.com/windo...leID=185303839
>>>
>>>"The snafu involving one of Microsoft's recent security patches
>>>continued to grow as the developer acknowledged new incompatibility
>>>problems with some video drivers and users on the company's forums
>>>complained about having to uninstall the fix or resort to unsanctioned
>>>repairs."
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> On other news, a multiplatform virus won't propagate on Linux
>> installation because of bug in Kernel
>> (http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl...4/18/2046203):
>>
>> "Newsforge is reporting that Linus Torvalds took a few minutes to review
>> the cross-platform proof of concept virus covered yesterday and has
>> proven that the virus does indeed not work with latest kernel version
>> 2.6.16 and even released a patch in order to fix this "problem." From the
>> article: "The reason that the virus is not propagating itself in the
>> latest kernel versions is due to a bug in how GCC handles specific
>> registers in a particular system call. [...] So the virus did a number of
>> strange things to make this show up, but on the other hand the kernel
>> does try to avoid touching user registers, even if we've never really
>> _guaranteed_ that. So the 2.6.16 effect is a mis-feature, even if a
>> _normal_ app would never care. It just happened to bite the infection
>> logic of your virus thing." "
>>
>> My point is that there's no perfect OS, because they are all developed by
>> not-so-perfect-humans.
>>
>
> So the so called proof of concept, note Proof of Concept, not out there
> in the wild, now just about works.
>
> Shows Linus's contempt for this virus by fixing it....LOL.....how many
> actual wild windows viruses are there? 4000? 8000? 30,000?
>

fixing the kernel (that was Mauricios point)

So the 2.6.16 effect is a mis-feature, even if a _normal_ app would never
care
<snip>

>
> regards
>
> thing

--
Rule 6: There is no Rule 6.

On Wed, 19 Apr 2006 19:29:05 +1200, thingy wrote:

> Lets face it, even with only a small amount of Linux desktops out there,
> whoever writes the first cross platform virus that infects a Linux box
> as well as a Windows one will be (in)famous...

Yeah - but for a Linux virus to exist in the wild it needs to be able to
do the following:

1/ get to the dumb luser's email inbox.

2/ get viewed by the dumb luser.

3/ get saved somewhere in the dumb user's home directory.

4/ get it's permissions changed by the dumb luser (who BTW doesn't know
what permissions are) so that it becomes executable.

5/ get executed by the dumb luser that is so obviously in need of
intensive LART therapy.

6/ distribute itself to the contents of the dumb luser's email address
book in the vain hope of finding some other luser just as moronic as the
one it's just crapped on.

That's four discrete stages that the luser must manually do after having
received the virus before the virus can redistribute itself.

And even then the worst it could do would be to delete the contents of the
luser's home directory.


Have A Nice Cup of Tea

--
Andreas Girardet: "In Suse, there are about 15,000 to 20,000
developers working on the project, and internally at Novell
we have about 1,000 developers devoted just to Suse."

"Have A Nice Cup of Tea" <> wrote in message
news...
> On Wed, 19 Apr 2006 19:29:05 +1200, thingy wrote:
>
>> Lets face it, even with only a small amount of Linux desktops out there,
>> whoever writes the first cross platform virus that infects a Linux box
>> as well as a Windows one will be (in)famous...
>
> Yeah - but for a Linux virus to exist in the wild it needs to be able to
> do the following:
>
> 1/ get to the dumb luser's email inbox.
>
> 2/ get viewed by the dumb luser.
>
> 3/ get saved somewhere in the dumb user's home directory.
>
> 4/ get it's permissions changed by the dumb luser (who BTW doesn't know
> what permissions are) so that it becomes executable.
>
> 5/ get executed by the dumb luser that is so obviously in need of
> intensive LART therapy.
>
> 6/ distribute itself to the contents of the dumb luser's email address
> book in the vain hope of finding some other luser just as moronic as the
> one it's just crapped on.
>
> That's four discrete stages that the luser must manually do after having
> received the virus before the virus can redistribute itself.
>
> And even then the worst it could do would be to delete the contents of the
> luser's home directory.
>
>

Really? Nothing that a bit of Social Engineering couldn't accomplish, right?

Just send an e-mail to a user (let's not call him/her a luser simply because
they are not well versed in IT) and say something such as

"This is an important update for your Linux box. It will prevent an error
that causes all your files to be erased from the hard drive. To make sure
this important update works, please follow these steps:

> 3/ get saved somewhere in the dumb user's home directory.
>
> 4/ get it's permissions changed by the dumb luser (who BTW doesn't know
> what permissions are) so that it becomes executable.
>
> 5/ get executed by the dumb luser that is so obviously in need of
> intensive LART therapy.
>
> 6/ distribute itself to the contents of the dumb luser's email address
> book in the vain hope of finding some other luser just as moronic as the
> one it's just crapped on.
>


--

Mauricio Freitas
www.geekzone.co.nz, www.geekzone.co.nz/freitasm,
www.geekzone.co.nz/geekzoneblog.asp
Software for Pocket PC: www.geekzone.co.nz/store
Microsoft MVP Mobile Devices