Re: Bind in FreeBSD, security advisories

2013-07-30 Thread Peter Maxwell
On 30 July 2013 21:03, Daniel Kalchev  wrote:

>
> On 30.07.2013, at 19:49, Peter Maxwell  wrote:
>
> > I personally prefer qmail over sendmail
> > but I wouldn't suggest qmail should be in base for the reason that
> sendmail
> > is the de facto standard on *nix shaped systems.
> >
>
> One can argue that BIND is the de facto standard on *nix shaped systems too


Yes, that is precisely my point, the preceding sentences to what you
quoted...

"That's not a good idea: any environment larger than a home network or SME
that relies on bind will not find it easy to migrate. It's one thing asking
people to tolerate a 2min inconvenience to make a choice to install bind
from ports (when they've can also choose bind or, say, djbdns, etc), it's
quite another to suggest to them they should be using different software,
essentially on a whim."
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Re: Bind in FreeBSD, security advisories

2013-07-30 Thread Peter Maxwell
On 30 July 2013 16:58, Daniel Kalchev  wrote:

>
> On 30.07.13 18:26, Peter Maxwell wrote:
>
>> On 30 July 2013 14:42,  wrote:
>>
>>
>>  Yes, I know everything can be installed from packages/ports. Two of
>>> *my* main reasons for using FreeBSD is that:
>>>
>>> 1. It's an integrated *system*, not just a kernel.
>>>
>>>  That's not an argument for retaining something that is non-essential for
>> most people and can easily be installed from ports.  There is very little
>> that is actually essential in base... having to turn sendmail off on every
>> new installation already does my nut in but having mail facilities is
>> essential, so it has to be there.
>>
>
> I am surprised why so many people insist having an MTA is necessary, but
> having well testes recursive DNS resolver is not.
> Even on a typical "client" installation, it is more likely the resolver
> will be useful, than the MTA.
>

Sendmail - or something equivalent - is required to handle system mail from
things like system utility scripts, e.g. periodic.  A caching or recursive
DNS resolver, strictly, is not essential.  Given the number of SAs in bind,
it would arguably be better positioned in ports from an upgrade point of
view.




>
> By the way, both sendmail and BIND are off by default...


No, sendmail is on by default, cf.
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/books/handbook/mail-changingmta.html

It's only inbound SMTP handling that is default off.  To turn sendmail off
completely, you need to do something like set sendmail_enable="NONE" in
your rc.conf and have a replacement already setup.




>
>
>  Having bind in base does have one advantage in that it is more carefully
>> scrutinised that it would likely be in ports.
>>
>
> This too..
>
> I have always viewed FreeBSD not as an product, but instead as an toolkit.
> A toolkit, from which to build the OS you need.
> So far, FreeBSD has worked better for that purpose than any other toolkit
> around (plus, I am biased).
>

It's less useful as a toolkit when you need to upgrade, say, sshd or
openssl but for whatever reason cannot upgrade the base system... it can be
quite a bit of hassle managing the ports version while you've still got the
base version there.  It's not difficult but it's still a pain; when you're
dealing with hundreds of servers, every corner-case makes ongoing
maintenance harder.

My position would be that if it is third-party and not absolutely
essential, it should be in ports.



>
> There are a number of knobs, that let you customize FreeBSD to your
> heart's content.
>

Eh, hmmm, sort of.  As above, some things require upgrading the base system
which can be a bit of an issue in production environments when you cannot
arrange a suitable maintenance window - a scenario that is very common
indeed.  You are then forced to start using ports to replace the
functionality in base and it all gets rather non-standard and messy.




>
> In theory, everything but the absolute minimum of the base system might be
> removed.. and have everything depend on ports. However, the base system is
> just that -- one collection of code that gets built and tested together.
> This brings quality.
>

Yet, as the OP pointed out: bind is not what I would term "quality",
there's more SAs posted than I've had hot dinners.  Given it is
non-essential, it could quite easily be stripped out.




>
> Having said this, it is perfectly ok to replace BIND with any other
> resolver + name server as long as there is suitable candidate that has
> passed enough testing. Is there one? Do we know enough of their quirks?
>

That's not a good idea: any environment larger than a home network or SME
that relies on bind will not find it easy to migrate.  It's one thing
asking people to tolerate a 2min inconvenience to make a choice to install
bind from ports (when they've can also choose bind or, say, djbdns, etc),
it's quite another to suggest to them they should be using different
software, essentially on a whim.  I personally prefer qmail over sendmail
but I wouldn't suggest qmail should be in base for the reason that sendmail
is the de facto standard on *nix shaped systems.
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Re: Bind in FreeBSD, security advisories

2013-07-30 Thread Peter Maxwell
On 30 July 2013 14:42,  wrote:

> > > For years, a lot of security advisories have been present for bind.
> > > I'm just guessing if it's not a good idea to remove bind from base?
> > >
> > > This will probably free by half the number of FreeBSD SA's in the
> future.
> > >
> >
> > Sure, but no bind in base also implies no dig, nslookup or host.
>
> Exactly. It's a slippery slope - if we continue removing useful
> functionality from FreeBSD there are fewer and fewer arguments for
> why one should use FreeBSD and not Linux.
>

Having lots of third-party software in base is not one of those reasons
however.



>
> Yes, I know everything can be installed from packages/ports. Two of
> *my* main reasons for using FreeBSD is that:
>
> 1. It's an integrated *system*, not just a kernel.
>

That's not an argument for retaining something that is non-essential for
most people and can easily be installed from ports.  There is very little
that is actually essential in base... having to turn sendmail off on every
new installation already does my nut in but having mail facilities is
essential, so it has to be there.

Having bind in base does have one advantage in that it is more carefully
scrutinised that it would likely be in ports.




> 2. The base system contains a lot of the useful functionality I need.
>

So does ports.



>
> and every contrib part which is removed, detracts from this.
>

No, it doesn't.  The base system should be just that - a base minimal
installation.
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Re: Problem entering GELI password at boot

2013-07-21 Thread Peter Maxwell
I've seen similar behaviour recently intermittently on releng-9.1 on an
laptop (HP) with USB keyboard, and like you said I had also seen it a
number of years ago when 8.0 first came out with a desktop with USB
keyboard (iirc, it was an HP as well).  It seems fine most of the time but
occasionally it won't respond to keyboard input, especially if I've
accidentally left the computer for a few moments before attempting to enter
the passphrase.

Vaguely remember it was something to do with AHCI but it was years ago and
given it's not a massive problem the now I haven't bothered to look it up
again.



On 21 July 2013 14:55,  wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I recently up consists of a ZFS RAID-1 upon a GELI-encrypted container.
> Before the update I could enter the passphrases during boot (before root
> mount) via my USB keyboard and geli would created the nodes and root could
> be mounted.
> In 8.0 I had a related problem (some keystrokes would not be recognized)
> but this has been fixed since. Now the keyboard is functional (I can scroll
> up and down) but GELI doesn't recognize anything (not even 'return').
>
> Any ideas or hints?
>
> Thanks!
>
>
>
>
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Re: 8.1 xl + dual-speed Netgear hub = yoyo

2011-10-23 Thread Peter Maxwell
On 21 October 2011 16:00,  wrote:

>
> ...snip...
>
> Both connections were using the same (short) Cat5 cable, I tried two
> different ports on the 10/100 hub, and other systems work OK on that
> 10/100 hub.
>
> How do I get this interface to operate properly at 100MB?
>
>
...snip...

"Auto-negotiation" is a nightmare, and *will* cause you problems.  The best
you can do is try to try to set every device using the switch to 100Mbps
full, if that doesn't work buy a proper switch.
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