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Date:      Sun, 8 Dec 2002 21:38:36 -0600
From:      "Matthew D. Fuller" <fullermd@over-yonder.net>
To:        "Geoffrey C. Speicher" <geoff@speicher.org>
Cc:        Don Bowman <don@sandvine.com>, "'freebsd-stable@freebsd.org'" <freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG>
Subject:   Re: pw useradd not atomic?
Message-ID:  <20021209033836.GE67692@over-yonder.net>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.BSF.4.05.10212070241001.479-100000@speicher.org>
References:  <FE045D4D9F7AED4CBFF1B3B813C8533701023135@mail.sandvine.com> <Pine.BSF.4.05.10212070241001.479-100000@speicher.org>

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On Sat, Dec 07, 2002 at 02:46:02AM -0500 I heard the voice of
Geoffrey C. Speicher, and lo! it spake thus:
> On Fri, 6 Dec 2002, Don Bowman wrote:
> 
> > Sometimes after this script been run I end up with only the
> > last few lines of the groups file.
> > 
> > Is 'pw' not atomic somehow? The lines that are there seem
> > complete, i'm just missing the first 100 lines or so. Its
> > not always the same amount missing.
> 
> This is discussed in bin/38676 in gnats, but there has been no followup
> since June.  This problem bit me more than once by corrupting
> master.passwd, so I'm running a locally patched version until some kind of
> fix hits -stable.

There was also a good long discussion on -stable and -hackers over it.
See PR bin/40127 for some of the code I had written to wrap a giant lock
around it in a way that is generalized.  Somewhere, I have the patches to
pw(8) and friends to use that code that I could dig up; many of them were
posted on the various threads referenced in that PR.

I may be able to resurrect all my patches if there's interest; the
previous thread pretty much petered out without anybody with a commit bit
poking in enough interest to do anything with it.


-- 
Matthew Fuller     (MF4839)   |  fullermd@over-yonder.net
Systems/Network Administrator |  http://www.over-yonder.net/~fullermd/

"The only reason I'm burning my candle at both ends, is because I
      haven't figured out how to light the middle yet"

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