Re: teTeX (was Re: dvips top margin)
bigl == bigl [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: bigl On Wed, 25 Sep 1996 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Is this still Debian related? Erick bigl As far as I read this list about 70-80% of messages are bigl off-topic but there is no sharp edge between normal unix bigl questions (or specialy about one package) and Debian bigl questions. I've found on this list many interesting things not bigl about creating .deb packages or something like this but about bigl something really different (thanks to all of you :-) ). So i bigl think that any censorship should be used very careful. Especially when the previous posts were about the shortcomings of the Debian LaTeX system and merits of a LaTeX distribution that is a potential debian package. Such a debian package will be welcomed by many (including myself). -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
Re: dvips top margin
Dirk == Dirk Eddelbuettel [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Dirk Correct. Also the app-defaults file for xdvi sets a4 paper and Dirk deskjet mode. We really need a script that sets these. Dirk Any takers? teTeX is a high quality LaTeX distribution which takes care of these settings with a nice menu-driven utility. It would be easier to debianise teTeX than to fix the current Debian LaTeX system (other than the inflexible configuration, some features like previewing documents with ps fonts with xdvi are broken in Debian). -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
Re: dvips top margin
Dirk == Dirk Eddelbuettel [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Billy (other than the inflexible configuration, some features like Billy previewing documents with ps fonts with xdvi are broken in Billy Debian). Dirk Not so. I am both LaTeX'ing and xdvi'ing with psfonts on Debian Dirk boxes with no problems. Dirk You just have to add gsftopk, and modify MakeTeXPK (I send a Dirk patch in a mail archived with bug#3414) and psfonts.map Dirk slightly. I have been planing to package this, but find no time Dirk to do it. If anybody wants to do this, I'd be more than happy to Dirk help. I considered it broken because the stable distribution does not contain all that is needed for that purpose (debian doesn't even have a gsftopk package). teTeX works ``out-of-the-box''. I, for one, would prefer a large but nicely put-together and hassle-free distribution than the current debian LaTeX system. I am not saying the current system is bad. There are just a few rough corners. I would consider packaging teTeX myself if I am not moving out of the country in less than a month. -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
Re: time to split the list?
Ken == Ken Gaugler [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Ken Maybe debian-user and debian-install, to keep it simple? I second this. -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
X11 and LaTeX minimal install
Dear debianers, A minimal X (and LaTeX) installation requires several debian packages, but most people either do not want X or want at least a minimal installation, right? So what are the justifications of splitting a minimal X and LaTeX the way it is? Thanks. -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
NFS install
Dear list members, I am looking for NFS mountable debian mirrors in Europe. TIA. -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
Strange dpkg install problem
Hi, I observed what appears to be a very strange problem when using dpkg to install workbone (I realised that it is now orphaned and is still aout). If I install workbone again when it is already installed, dpkg says it is replacing the old package. But after the replacement, the binary `workbone' is missing. `workbone.1' is missing too. dpkg -L workbone still shows these files. Same problem for cdtool. The problem is best illustrated by the following log. --- start - [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # cat /etc/debian_version 1.1 [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # dpkg -l dpkg workbone Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge | Status=Not/Installed/Config-files/Unpacked/Failed-config/Half-installed |/ Err?=(none)/Hold/Reinst-required/X=both-problems (Status,Err: uppercase=bad) ||/ NameVersionDescription +++-===-==- ii dpkg1.2.6elf Package maintenance system for Debian Linux ii workbone2.3-3 Simple text-based CD Player [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # dpkg --purge workbone (Reading database ... 15702 files and directories currently installed.) Removing workbone ... Purging configuration files for workbone ... [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # which workbone [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # dpkg --install workbone-2.3-3.deb Selecting previously deselected package workbone. (Reading database ... 15699 files and directories currently installed.) Unpacking workbone (from workbone-2.3-3.deb) ... Setting up workbone ... [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # which workbone /usr/bin/workbone [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # dpkg --install workbone-2.3-3.deb (Reading database ... 15702 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to replace workbone (using workbone-2.3-3.deb) ... Unpacking replacement workbone ... Setting up workbone ... [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # dpkg -s workbone Package: workbone Status: install ok installed Priority: optional Section: sound Maintainer: D.J. Gregor [EMAIL PROTECTED] Version: 2.3-3 Description: Simple text-based CD Player [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # which workbone [EMAIL PROTECTED]:~/Debian/tmp/upgrades/tmp # -- end -- Anyone else has the same experience? Thanks. -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
Re: DEBIAN Linux on floppy disks
Steve == Steve Preston [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Steve You need to 'split' the .deb files that are too big. This Steve requires dpkg-split, but I am not aware of a WIN95 version of Steve this. If you created a (relatively minimal) linux partition on Steve your cdrom machine, then you could split the .deb files and Steve copy them to floppies. Maybe it's easier to find a MSDOS port of GNU tar and then tar the required packages on multiple volumes which are then transferrable to the laptop. -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
Re: PPP problem w/ 1.1 install
Brian == Brian C White [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Brian But is there a self-compiled-kernel-image? At least the new Brian diald (in Incoming) depends on kernel-image. Brian So... Should there be a restriction against listing the Brian kernel-image as a dependancy in another package? I don't think packages should `depend' on kernel-image. I don't have kernel-image installed although it is listed as `essential'. I boot into Debian using loadlin and sometimes floppies. -- Billy C.-M. Chow [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian Linux
Find+rm security hole in debian?
I received the following concerning a security problem with clean-up
cron jobs that use find+rm.
Any comments from gurus?
-Billy
- -- Forwarded message --
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:10:36 -0400 (EDT)
From: Zygo Blaxell [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [linux-security] Things NOT to put in root's crontab
Sigh. Here are several things I've just removed from /etc/crontab on
every RedHat Linux system I can get my hands on. They contain security
holes related to the use of 'find' and 'rm' to expire old files in /tmp
and other places.
It seems that awareness of this type of security problem is rather low,
so I'll explain the class of problem and how to fix it.
From Redhat's /etc/crontab file:
# Remove /var/tmp files not accessed in 10 days
43 02 * * * root find /var/tmp/* -atime +3 -exec rm -f {} \; 2 /dev/null
# Remove /tmp files not accessed in 10 days
# I commented out this line because I tend to store stuff in /tmp
# 41 02 * * * root find /tmp/* -atime +10 -exec rm -f {} \; 2 /dev/null
# Remove formatted man pages not accessed in 10 days
39 02 * * * root find /var/catman/cat?/* -atime +10 -exec rm -f {} \; 2
/dev/null
# Remove and TeX fonts not used in 10 days
35 02 * * * root find /var/lib/texmf/* -type f -atime +10 -exec rm -f {} \; 2
/dev/null
Folks, do NOT use 'find' on a public directory with '-exec rm -f' as root.
Period. Ever. Delete it from your crontab *now* and finish reading the
rest of this message later.
* PROBLEM DISCUSSION AND EXPLOITATION
The immediate security problem is that 'rm' doesn't check that
components of the directory name are not symlinks. This means that you
can delete any file on the system; indeed, with a little work you can
delete *every* file on the system, provided that you can determine the
file names (though you might be limited to deleting files more than ten
days old).
First, create the directories and file:
/tmp/hacker-fest/some/arbitrary/set/of/path/names/etc/passwd
where all but the last component is a directory. Be ready to
replace 'etc' with a symlink to '/etc', so that:
/tmp/hacker-fest/some/arbitrary/set/of/path/names/etc - /etc
i.e. the path components of the file name will point to a file named
'passwd' in a different directory.
If the replacement operation occurs between when 'find' sets {} to
/tmp/hacker...etc/passwd and when 'rm' calls unlink on
/tmp/hacker...etc/passwd, then rm will in fact delete '/etc/passwd',
and not a file in /tmp. Deleting other files is left as an exercise.
The race condition is really easy to win. Create a directory with 400
path components, like this:
...
[clip]
...
* OTHER PROBLEMS WITH THIS CRONTAB
A user can set the atime of any file they own to an arbitrary value, and
that programs like zip, tar, and cpio will do this for you
automatically; this makes 'atime' an almost useless indicator of when a
file was last used ('mtime' has the same problem). Either the file will
be deleted too early, because it was extracted from an archive using a
program that preserves timestamps, or users can set the atime to well
into the future and use /tmp space indefinitely. The later of ctime (to
detect writes) and atime (to detect reads; must check that atime is not
in the future) is a good indicator of when a file was last used.
...
[clip]
...
* SAFE LRU GARBAGE COLLECTION
Our LRU /tmp garbage collector daemon is available at
URL:http://www.ultratech.net/~zblaxell/admin_utils/filereaper.txt. It
is implemented in perl5. It depends on a Linux-specific 'statfs()'
system call to monitor available free space, so non-Linux people will
need to do a port (send me patches and I'll incorporate them).
Our garbage collector:
handles the above security problems correctly,
handles pathnames more than 1024 characters,
uses smarter last-access estimates than just atime or ctime,
can support permanent subdirectories,
handles files, symlinks, directories, devices, mount points correctly,
can support minimum age of files (e.g. no files 1 day old),
deletes oldest files first,
deletes files only when disk space is low,
and responds in less than ten seconds to low disk space conditions.
Our garbage collector works on any directory where files can gracefully
disappear at arbitrary times, such as /var/catman, /tmp, /var/tmp,
TeX font directories, and our HTTP proxy cache. One directory where
the garbage collector doesn't work very well is /var/spool/news; we
had to hack things up a bit to fix the article databases when article
files disappear.
- --
Zygo Blaxell. Former Unix/soft/hardware guru, U of Waterloo Computer Science
Club. Current sysadmin for Myrus Design, Inc. 10th place, ACM Intl Collegiate
Programming Contest Finals, 1994. Administer Linux nets for food, clothing,
and anime. I gave up $1000 to avoid working on windoze... *sigh* - Amy Fong
- --
Billy C.-M. Chow
unstable/1.1 experiences, uucp still a.out?
Olaf == Olaf Erb [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Olaf the system is more Olaf sluggish. It's not a mem problem, it's 32mb (but only a 486/66) Olaf with 10mb free on average... Loading emacs freezes X11 Olaf completely for about 5 seconds, with a.out everything slowed Olaf down during emacs-startup, too, but not like now. That's the Olaf price we pay for new features.. Is it generally the case? I read somewhere (was it the ELF-OWTO?) that there should not be much difference betwen aout and elf in term of speed. I have only 8Mb ram on a 486-66. If performance will suffer a lot, I think I 'll defer upgrading to 1.1 until I get a better computer. -- Billy C.-M. Chow \\ [EMAIL PROTECTED] \\ Debian Linux
elv-fmt dumps core
Dear list members, On my 93R6, fmt (elv-fmt 1.8pl4-19) dumps core whenever I do `!}fmt' in vi (elv-vi 1.8pl4-19). Anyone else has this trouble? Any ideas how may I find out what's wrong. Thanks in advance. -- Billy C.-M. Chow // [EMAIL PROTECTED] // Debian Linux 1.3.84
LaTeX (in-)compatibility
Andreas == Andreas Wehler [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
Andreas 2.) Documents compiled with b) use more vertical space than
Andreas a), e. g. the same text is distributed on more pages. Most
Andreas annoying are hand-tuned pages from a). The command:
Andreas \setlength{\parskip}{1ex plus0.5ex minus0.2ex} makes no
Andreas difference.(??!)
Have you tried \renewcommand{\baselinestretch}{scale_factor}?
Andreas 3.) The ghostview-preview produced from b) is less readable
Andreas than that of b), given the same X11-terminal at resolution
Andreas 1152x900, magstep 0. The b)-fonts look a micro bit smaller,
Andreas most horizontal bars in t or f are missing at that
Andreas resolution and the e is ugly as well. This point is the
Andreas most important one, for addresses the readability of
Andreas previews!!!
Since you use ghostview, I presume you want to preview some PostScript
specials alongside with text in your document. I find it _far_ better
to use a new(ish) version of xdvik which invokes ghostscript for
displaying PostScript specials.
--
Billy C.-M. Chow // [EMAIL PROTECTED] // Debian Linux 1.3.84
