From owner-freebsd-security Wed Nov 15 22: 5:54 2000 Delivered-To: freebsd-security@freebsd.org Received: from winston.osd.bsdi.com (winston.osd.bsdi.com [204.216.27.229]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 97D4137B479; Wed, 15 Nov 2000 22:05:51 -0800 (PST) Received: from winston.osd.bsdi.com (jkh@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by winston.osd.bsdi.com (8.11.1/8.9.3) with ESMTP id eAG65SI48771; Wed, 15 Nov 2000 22:05:28 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from jkh@winston.osd.bsdi.com) To: Igor Roshchin Cc: kris@FreeBSD.ORG, rraykov@sageian.com, security@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: problem using sysinstall In-Reply-To: Message from Igor Roshchin of "Wed, 15 Nov 2000 17:58:13 EST." <200011152258.RAA91169@giganda.komkon.org> Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2000 22:05:28 -0800 Message-ID: <48767.974354728@winston.osd.bsdi.com> From: Jordan Hubbard Sender: owner-freebsd-security@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org > I wonder if there is a fundamental reason why /etc needs to be > overwritten, or it is just because the sysinstall is doing so. Guys.. This discussion is exceedingly silly. Sysinstall only extracts a fresh /etc when you INSTALL a binary system, just as it will happily format your disk if you choose to label and newfs everything from the appropriate editors. That is why you only choose installation of bin if you want to literally bring your system back to the *exact state* that a newly installed system at that release level would be at. There are many good reasons why someone might want to, such as an /etc directory that was completely spammed or suspect of having been tampered with. If what you're trying to do is actually UPGRADE a system, which is to say take a running system and modify it, then you are supposed to use sysinstall's Upgrade option. Upgrade will present you with many of the appropriate warnings about doing silly things like formatting your disk and it will save your /etc into a temporary directory and resurrect your local/changed files. You have simply been using the wrong option, it sounds like to me, and that's not a compelling argument to change an option which is used for other purposes when used correctly. - Jordan To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-security" in the body of the message