Configuration Information [Automatically generated, do not change]: Machine: i686 OS: linux-gnu Compiler: i686-pc-linux-gnu-gcc Compilation CFLAGS: -DPROGRAM='bash' -DCONF_HOSTTYPE='i686' -DCONF_OSTYPE='linux-gnu' -DCONF_MACHTYPE='i686-pc-linux-gnu' -DCONF_VENDOR='pc' -DLOCALEDIR='/usr/share/locale' -DPACKAGE='bash' -DSHELL -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I./include -I./lib -DDEFAULT_PATH_VALUE='/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin' -DSTANDARD_UTILS_PATH='/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin' -DSYS_BASHRC='/etc/bash/bashrc' -DSYS_BASH_LOGOUT='/etc/bash/bash_logout' -DNON_INTERACTIVE_LOGIN_SHELLS -DSSH_SOURCE_BASHRC -O3 -march=core2 -fomit-frame-pointer -pipe uname output: Linux koko 2.6.27-gentoo-r8 #1 SMP Wed Mar 18 21:02:33 GMT 2009 i686 Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU E1200 @ 1.60GHz GenuineIntel GNU/Linux Machine Type: i686-pc-linux-gnu
Bash Version: 4.0 Patch Level: 28 Release Status: release Description: When 1 <= $COLUMNS <= 5 the "help" builtin writes to an invalid bit of memory. Repeat-By: COLUMNS=5 help Fix: In builtins/help.def in show_builtin_command_help(), a $COLUMNS value that's <=0 is treated as being 80, but other values are used directly. But values under 6 are unsafe, as ($COLUMNS/2)-3 is used as in index to the local blurb[] array. One fix would thus be to change if (width <= 0) width = 80; to if (width <= 5) width = 80; That said, even slightly bigger widths don't yield very helpful output. "COLUMNS=10 help", for example, is all but useless in practice -- so perhaps a larger threshold should be used.