D. Boland writes: >> I still think you should name it differently. Marco has already mixed >> it up with Apache suexec… > > The idea kind of was to mix it up, so people will know what it does.
Apache suexec is concerned with running new processes as a different user, so both the "su" and the "exec" part of the name make sense. Your library is concerned with inserting itself into certain calls to swap uid/gid so programs expecting a fixed mapping of some uid/gid to certain capabilities (roughly associated with the concept of a root user) work without the actual source getting patched on a system where those assumptions aren't true. Looks like different thing to me and giving it a different name surely wouldn't hurt. > I noticed that you and other people already declare the user switching > technique half dead. It's a brilliant idea, you know. Because of its > simplicity. I did nothing of that sort. I said that the assumptions some of those programs make aren't true on many systems and have not been for a long time. > It's even patented. By referring to the Apache executable > I give the technique the glory and attention it deserves. Attaching to unrelated projects' names for glory is a surefire way to rile those projects up and sow confusion among users on both sides. > So most people are thinking 'Capabilities' nowadays... Sigh. This will > only steer admins away from finding out how user switching works and > applying it. Instead they will just run entire server processes as > admin-users. Again, running applications with the least privileges needed for a given task is a tried and valid concept. SWitching uid/gid to achieve that is an implementation detail that is not relevant to all systems. Give SELinux a spin and then come back to me. Regards, Achim. -- +<[Q+ Matrix-12 WAVE#46+305 Neuron microQkb Andromeda XTk Blofeld]>+ DIY Stuff: http://Synth.Stromeko.net/DIY.html