On Oct 9, 2007, at 2:20 PM, David Cole wrote:
---------SNIP---------
Hi Ed,
Perhaps I've been reading things too hurriedly. Maybe I missed the
thrust of Rick's comment.
What you are concerned about is the possibility of letting a
distribution copy of a product get out the door with a debugging
interface still activated. That, of course, can lead to unhappy
situations at customer sites should the debugging interface get
executed. I agree. That sort of thing must never be allowed to happen.
But to my mind, avoiding such a situation is very easy: Just make
the debugging interface "fail-safe". Code it so as to require some
additional action of environmental characteristic without which the
interface simply does nothing, NOPs as if it did not exist. And
there are any number of ways to do that:
One way is to code a closed permanent branch around the interface
activation code. Then a manual zap by the developer would be
required, without which the code could never be executed.
Another might be to require the presence of a secret keyword
ddname, example //DEBUGME DD DUMMY. Then a simple TIOT scan would
be all that was needed for the debugging interface to know whether
it should allow debugging or just step aside.
Another might be to check the environment for your own computer's
local SYSPLEX name, SMF name, CPU id/serial#, TSO userid, RACF
ownerid, ... whatever. Absent the right value, the debugging
interface would not permit debugging.
I really don't see that there is a serious problem here. (Or am I
still missing the point?)
Just a little. Even *IF* you were to only let the debug product work
in a specific environment (you gave a fair list) the problem comes in
to play about "exceptions". If people (ie programmers) were really
honest it would not be an issue but programmers have this attitude
what ever I can get away with I will and point fingers if he can't.
While I can say its not just programmers its a fair share as
programmers are bright and they can/do squeeze through any loop hole
that can be found. BTW after thinking it through I would rather not
have the dependancies name you mentioned as DR comes into play and
heaven help you if things don't work EXACTLY as they did in the home
system. The auditors would be screaming for my neck.
The secret DDNAME does not work unless it changes say every week (or
so) as people let the cat out of the bag without thinking. A long
time ago I put a daily changing password in cols 73-80 of the JCL
card to allow stepcat/jobcat to go through, I would suspect that the
code is still running to this day (15+ years later).
I have no experience with your code and I was not pointing out any
issues with your product (just OTHER debugging products).
Ed
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