From owner-freebsd-hackers Thu Feb 15 07:01:09 1996 Return-Path: owner-hackers Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.3/8.7.3) id HAA02982 for hackers-outgoing; Thu, 15 Feb 1996 07:01:09 -0800 (PST) Received: from fw.ast.com (fw.ast.com [165.164.6.25]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.3/8.7.3) with SMTP id HAA02977 for ; Thu, 15 Feb 1996 07:01:05 -0800 (PST) Received: from nemesis by fw.ast.com with uucp (Smail3.1.29.1 #2) id m0tn4wl-000858C; Thu, 15 Feb 96 08:46 CST Received: by nemesis.lonestar.org (Smail3.1.27.1 #20) id m0tn4rk-000C1CC; Thu, 15 Feb 96 08:41 WET Message-Id: Date: Thu, 15 Feb 96 08:41 WET To: hackers@freebsd.org From: uhclem@nemesis.lonestar.org (Frank Durda IV) Sent: Thu Feb 15 1996, 08:41:00 CST Subject: Re: Is "immutable" supposed to be a good idea? Sender: owner-hackers@freebsd.org Precedence: bulk [0]Oh, weird party trick: some time just before nuking a system to do [0]a fresh install or something, rm /sbin/init, halt and reboot and watch. [0]That is certainly not what other UNIX systems do... [1]It is most certainly what other Unix systems do. Someone mistakenly [1]wiped out init on an Ultrix box at my University (they thought they were [1]deleting an old user account, rm -rf *), and it required a complete [1]re-install to get things working. I wiped out init in the 386bsd days, [1]but luckily I was able to recover by installing a new version of init [1]off the install floppy. Actually, most UNIX (and XENIX) systems simply say "panic: no init" instead of doing what we do. Even in this state, you can recover with a boot floppy (if you have one). Otherwise, it is reinstall time. (Kids, don't try this at home.) Frank Durda IV | or uhclem%nemesis@rwsystr.nkn.net | ^------(this is the fastest route)| or ...letni!rwsys!nemesis!uhclem |