From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Oct 28 01:48:24 2004 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 602E016A4D0; Thu, 28 Oct 2004 01:48:24 +0000 (GMT) Received: from orthanc.ca (orthanc.ca [209.89.70.53]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 105AF43D4C; Thu, 28 Oct 2004 01:48:24 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from lyndon@orthanc.ca) Received: from d154-5-25-163.bchsia.telus.net (d154-5-25-163.bchsia.telus.net [154.5.25.163]) (authenticated bits=0) by orthanc.ca (8.13.1/8.13.1) with ESMTP id i9S1mIr2067362 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NO); Wed, 27 Oct 2004 19:48:20 -0600 (MDT) (envelope-from lyndon@orthanc.ca) Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 18:48:17 -0700 From: Lyndon Nerenberg To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org, Giorgos Keramidas Message-ID: <83E94C56ED57A6FAEC5C8F33@peregrin.orthanc.ca> In-Reply-To: <20041002081928.GA21439@gothmog.gr> References: <20041002081928.GA21439@gothmog.gr> X-Mailer: Mulberry/4.0.0a1 (Mac OS X) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline X-DCC-WEiAPG-Metrics: orthanc.ca 1072; Body=2 Fuz1=2 Fuz2=2 X-Spam-Status: No, score=3.4 required=5.0 tests=AWL,BAYES_00, HELO_DYNAMIC_IPADDR,RCVD_IN_NJABL_DUL,RCVD_IN_SORBS_DUL autolearn=no version=3.0.1 X-Spam-Level: *** X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.0.1 (2004-10-22) on orthanc.ca X-Mailman-Approved-At: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 12:30:58 +0000 Subject: Re: Protection from the dreaded "rm -fr /" X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 01:48:24 -0000 --On 2004-10-2 11:19 AM +0300 Giorgos Keramidas wrote: > John Beck, who works for Sun, has posted an entry in his blog > yesterday about "rm -fr /" protection, which I liked a lot: > http://blogs.sun.com/roller/page/jbeck/20041001#rm_rf_protection The best protection from 'rm -rf /' is an AT&T 3B4000 computer. I had the misfortune of dealing with one in the late '80s. After I convinced management that it was ... well ... a waste of time, we held a de-commissioning party. Somewhere around 2030 (hours) I took the liberty to do something I have wanted to do on a live production system for a long time: 1. login as root 2. rm -rf / We did this, in party mode, with a couple of bottles of champaign, streamers, and a bit of Frank Zappa and Cap't Beefheart in the background. By midnight, we were getting worried that last call at the pub would end before the machine. So, we left. And came back. And left again to come back with offsales, on account of said machine not only being deathly slow in life, but also in suicide. I think we gave up around 0530 and just pulled the AC from the box and went home. Or back to the bar. For a month. To get over the brain damage of the 3B4K. (We inflicted less upon ourselves :-) Of course, this was just a little while after All Of Usenet hit 5MB per day, so I don't expect anyone to get this anecdote correct on their MCSE exam :-) --lyndon