How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com)

Posted Feb 15, 2013 19:51 UTC (Fri) by spender (guest, #23067)
In reply to: How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com) by nix
Parent article: How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com)

One last thing! I forgot to mention to you nix how much I appreciate your previous kind words. I enjoyed them so much in fact that for my recent presentation in October they were made part of my presenter bio:
http://www.h2hc.com.br/h2hc/pt/palestrantes#Speaker2

I've also decided that I will dedicate to you my upcoming ARM blog, a weighty 3000+ word article on how I implemented proper kernel memory permissions and user/kernel address space separation on ARMv6+.

Thanks again for all your hard work, and may the rest of your day be as pleasant as you!

Sincerely,
-Brad

How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com)

Posted Feb 15, 2013 23:36 UTC (Fri) by ssmith32 (subscriber, #72404) [Link] (4 responses)

lol. You just made my day. Seriously, still laughing... :)

You flame the list, make absolutely no useful, constructive suggestions, then proceed make some long walk-around-the-park sarcastic remark about another user.. and then finally link to a collection of comments you curate that describe what a jerk some people say you are?

The last was the part that made me smile.. picturing a guy with his treasured list of "bad things nix said about me today" tucked away in a drawer, crooning over it... "my precious..."

I suppose I'm missing some history here.. you could be a great guy and all in real life, but on the face of it, that is.. so... weirdly anti-social.

Like I said I guess I missed something, but, can't figure out what..

But seriously.. if you don't like the linux people or respect the work or even use the software, why do you bother with it? If you don't like collaboration, why not take djb approach and just write your own kernel? I mean he's a difficult guy too, but he ends up making useful contributions that way.

I'm not the best programmer, I'm sure you could hack the crap out of me, and I struggle with people at time too.. but I do try to make sure I make a positive, constructive contribution to the world at the end of the day..

Take care,
-stu

How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com)

Posted Feb 16, 2013 0:11 UTC (Sat) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link]

Well I'm happy that at least you've found a way to feel superior to all involved without having to contribute anything of technical merit yourself!

Let me know when you've made that positive constructive contribution for today.

-Brad

How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com)

Posted Feb 16, 2013 3:39 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (2 responses)

Nah, Spender is almost always correct. He certainly produces something of quality (grsecurity) that is usable and has some interesting technical solutions.

However, nix's arguments about spender's attitude are spot on.

How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com)

Posted Feb 22, 2013 12:51 UTC (Fri) by ortalo (guest, #4654) [Link]

Dah.

We need to break that dichotomy between "users are not interested in security - look I can break their system any day in 2012" and "they found a DoS on my personal worthless phone and want me to stop me from making calls for business for one year - theses security guys are ivory tower idiots". (Note how both statements are equally stupid.)

That dichotomy *is* a problem. Maybe it has been maintained for a long time by people taking advantage of it for their own interest (such as writing reports about how long that single bug took to fix in the kernel, or grabbing budgets for entirely unsecure e-voting machines and other miscellaneous devices).
It has also been maintained by some of our short sightedness. We are culprit of not having studied enough the reasons for the existing disagrement on the level of necessary computer security mechanism in our systems, it deserves more studying.

Stated differently, the day we will say "that performance/usability vs. security debate is over, we know how to decide and agree on such questions (without forking entirely different systems)" - that day we will be able to claim higher security than proprietary systems. And that's doable.

How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com)

Posted Feb 25, 2013 17:29 UTC (Mon) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]

I believe the line was "if you didn't use code written by assholes, your system would not boot". However, that doesn't mean one should go out of one's way to encourage developers in critical positions to be as unpleasant as possible!

How The Linux Foundation and Fedora are Addressing Workstation Security (Linux.com)

Posted Feb 25, 2013 17:31 UTC (Mon) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]

OK, so you actually *enjoy* having people point out that you are restricting the distribution and use of your own software through being pointlessly confrontational and antisocial?!

It is beyond me to see why anyone would value such a thing. (But then, I spent a huge proportion of my time over the past thirty-plus years attempting to become less abrasive and socially uncomprehending: I guess that makes it hard for me to see why attempting to make people dislike you could be considered a *good* thing.)