Linux-Misc Digest #735, Volume #19 Sun, 4 Apr 99 12:13:09 EDT
Contents:
Re: emacs launches internet connection ("David Z. Maze")
Re: News path ("Anders G. Olstad")
Re: Library types for Newbies ("David Z. Maze")
Re: hackers ("David Z. Maze")
Re: [Help] PPP worked but now fails [modem q] (Matt)
Re: Proposal: "Linux 2000 Platform" (Jeremy Crabtree)
StarOffice 5.0 Filter Update? (Jeffery Cann)
BUS error - Netscape (Ilya)
Re: hackers (David M. Cook)
Re: Modest proposal, (was: Re: hacked /bin/login: can't replace it) (Kalle Olavi
Niemitalo)
Re: What is the best Linux to install? (Peter Chant)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "David Z. Maze" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.emacs
Subject: Re: emacs launches internet connection
Date: 04 Apr 1999 10:20:22 -0400
Eric Bohn <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
EB> Why is it that emacs launches my internet connection whenever I start it?
EB> It's just a text editor right?
*laugh maniacally*
Some things you can do in Emacs that aren't straight text editing:
M-x gnus (reads mail and news)
M-x yow (prints a random Zippy the Pinhead quote)
M-x doctor (runs the 'Eliza' program)
M-x psychoanalyze-pinhead (combines the last two)
EB> Is there any way to keep it from doing this?
So, what's happening is that Emacs is trying to find the name of your
machine when it starts up. If the system can't find it in /etc/hosts,
it'll ask the nameserver, which initiates an on-demand dialup
connection. Check that your system is listed in /etc/hosts; mine
looks like
127.0.0.1 localhost
18.208.0.22 donut.mit.edu donut
EB> Does anyone else have a recommendation for a console and/or X
EB> based text editor thats easy to use (I consider vi to be too
EB> complicated).
(vi isn't complicated so much as *different*; IMHO using it for
straight text editing is faster than doing the same in Emacs. I use
XEmacs, which is pretty but has the disadvantage of being very large,
and vim, which is also pretty but in some ways less featureful than
Emacs, but also is much smaller. Try ':help' in vim.)
--
David Maze [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://donut.mit.edu/dmaze/
"Hey, Doug, do you mind if I push the Emergency Booth Self-Destruct Button?"
"Oh, sure, Dave, whatever...you _do_ know what that does, right?"
------------------------------
From: "Anders G. Olstad" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: News path
Crossposted-To: news.software.nntp
Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 16:18:23 +0200
Baxter Tocher <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> When I send out a test message to a test newsgroup and look at the path
> after I collected news, I see:
> news.ednet.co.uk!localhost.localdomain!nobody
> Do I need to reconfigure something? If so, what?
You might set another hostname than localhost.localdomain, but I don't
think that's necessary for your newsreading/writing. Unless you're running
a newsserver on your linux box.
--
Anders Gulden Olstad @ Brinkley | * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
RedHat 5.2 Linux kernel 2.0.36 | "Penguins are generally nice creatures"
------------------------------
From: "David Z. Maze" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Library types for Newbies
Date: 04 Apr 1999 10:23:01 -0400
Elliott Paiken <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
EP> I was just wondering what the difference between the glibc
EP> libraries and the libc5 libraries and what effect does each have
EP> on your PC running linux?
They're, um, different versions of the same thing. glibc has the
official blessing of the Free Software Foundation, and IIRC libc5's
maintainer abandoned it to join the glibc team. So libc5 is
essentially unmaintained, and just about every current distribution,
save Slackware, uses glibc.
It's okay to have both libraries on your system, so that you can run
binaries from other Linux boxen.
--
David Maze [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://donut.mit.edu/dmaze/
"Hey, Doug, do you mind if I push the Emergency Booth Self-Destruct Button?"
"Oh, sure, Dave, whatever...you _do_ know what that does, right?"
------------------------------
From: "David Z. Maze" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: kingston.os.linux,comp.os.linux.networking
Subject: Re: hackers
Date: 04 Apr 1999 10:31:05 -0400
Not a network question at all, and I've never heard of the kingston.*
heirarchy. Followups set to comp.os.linux.misc.
4bbkt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
4bbkt> I'm not much of a hacker but I do use Linux. I'm running
4bbkt> RedHat5.2 and I'm on a LAN connected though cablemodem by an
4bbkt> old 486 with Slackware96. I'm up late working and I notice
4bbkt> things are getting slow. I run top and I see that user:nobody
4bbkt> is running find with PRI 20!!! All of a sudden there's another
4bbkt> process running "make whatis". I killed that and some other
4bbkt> processes including an instance of gawk, I then literrally
4bbkt> pulled the plug on my cablemodem. I looked in /var/log but I
4bbkt> can't find anything. What, if anything,can I do to trace this
4bbkt> hacker?
You didn't find *anything* in, say, /var/log/messages? When things
like this happen on my system, I usually get messages from the cron
daemon. So to disable this massive security hole I...
*coughs*
Oh, sorry. To "trace this hacker", you should look at the source for
the cron package, and probably files in /etc/cron.*. It's a Feature.
What's really going on: there's a reasonably standard program called
'locate' which can find a file somewhere on the system. Once a day,
it needs to create a database of every file installed, so it can find
things quickly. (Compare 'locate file' with 'find / -name file';
which one is quicker?) There's also a reasonably standard program
called 'man', which has as a utility a program called 'whatis'.
('whatis whatis'?) This also has a database, which needs to be
updated once a day.
On my system, I've got cron jobs like this set to run at 5:25 each
morning, a time when I'm fairly unlikely to be awake. Yes, some of
these jobs (especially 'updatedb', which updates the locate database)
generate jobs with a lot of disk activity that run as 'nobody'. Don't
worry about it (or do, if you want, but look at what cron is doing in
this case); it's perfectly normal.
--
David Maze [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://donut.mit.edu/dmaze/
"Hey, Doug, do you mind if I push the Emergency Booth Self-Destruct Button?"
"Oh, sure, Dave, whatever...you _do_ know what that does, right?"
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 04 Apr 1999 15:08:25 +0100
From: Matt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Help] PPP worked but now fails [modem q]
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.linux.networking,comp.os.linux.setup,comp.os.linux.help,comp.os.linux.hardware
Andy,
Fixed... I removed the AT&F modem string
and replaced it with ATZ and hey presto it worked fine.
I now have a voice/fax/data 56k v90 modem working under
linux (USR message external).
Many thanks
Matt
Andy Lyttle wrote:
>
> In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> , Matt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: ATDT08450801000^M^M
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: CONNECT -- got it
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: send (^M)
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: expect (Host Name:)
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: CSI -- got it
> > Apr 3 08:16:12 compuserve chat[200]: User Id
> > Apr 3 08:16:12 compuserve chat[200]: <user id> -- got it
> >
> > etc etc....
> >
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: ATDT08450801000^M^M
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: CONNECT -- got it
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: send (^M)
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: expect (Host Name:)
> > Apr 3 08:15:27 compuserve chat[200]: 49333/ARQ^M
> > Apr 3 08:16:12 compuserve chat[200]: ^\@`^N^\^\GG^\G^N^\@
> > Apr 3 08:16:12 compuserve pppd[197]: Connect script failed
> > Apr 3 08:16:12 compuserve pppd[197]: Exit.
> > Apr 3 08:16:12 compuserve chat[200]: alarm
> > Apr 3 08:16:12 compuserve chat[200]: Failed
> > Apr 3 08:17:04 compuserve kernel: PPP: ppp line discipline successfully
> > unregistered
>
> Same modem on both boxen? Same port speed? IRQ settings check out? Looks
> like line noise or something similar... Try swapping cables?
>
> - Andy Lyttle
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> http://www.bigfoot.com/~phroggy/
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Jeremy Crabtree)
Crossposted-To: alt.os.linux,comp.os.linux.advocacy,comp.os.linux.development.system
Subject: Re: Proposal: "Linux 2000 Platform"
Date: 3 Apr 1999 21:16:08 GMT
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Christopher B. Browne allegedly wrote:
>On 3 Apr 1999 02:27:44 GMT, Jeremy Crabtree <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> posted:
>>Christopher B. Browne allegedly wrote:
>>>-> Doubtless there are some Grail partisans...
>>
>>Is that the awful beast written in TCL/Tk ?
>
>I'm not aware of any "awful beasts written in TCL/Tk;" Grail is one of
>the longstanding sample applications written in Python.
I may be confused, but ISTR seeing a Web browser written entirely in
TCL/Tk. <SHUDDER>
[SNIP, chimera]
>>>-> Who knows? The Mnemonic guys might get theirs "productionized,"
>>> and it might well be preferable to Netscape.
>>
>>I've not heard of that one.
>
>It's written in C++, and they're presently proceeding with using CORBA
>a whole lot with it.
>
>Those that can remember back to *last* March, Mnemonic was getting a
>lot of attention last Feb/March as the "componentized" web browser
>where you'd just load in the parts that you really needed. Interest
>dropped instantly as soon as Netscape released Mozilla source code.
>
>Dumb move on peoples' parts, but entirely predictable based on the
>widespread excitement about "Netscape going Open Source!!!!!!"
>
>It is worthy of note that there is not, even yet, a "production"
>release of Mozilla. I ran the "M3" beta-edition a few weeks ago once;
>suffice it to say that it needs some work before anyone will care to
>use it as a replacement for any of the other "browsing options."
>
>Anyway, Mnemonic efforts seem to be back under way; see
><http://www.mnemonic.browser.org/> for details.
Hrmm...cool...I'll go have a look in a bit.
>>>Frankly, I think that the "best" standardization would be done much as
>>>with EDITOR/VISUAL; one would set the environment variables
>>>HELP_BROWSER, SSL_BROWSER, BROWSER, and the system pick one on
>>>demand...
>>>
>>>Further multiplexing would be doable by setting those variables to run
>>>shell scripts that check on system configuration and dynamically
>>>figure out what to do.
>>
>>Interesting...sounds a mite complex, but still interesting.
>
>The following little script is what I reference with EDITOR and
>VISUAL; it checks to see if XEmacs or GNU Emacs are running, and
>latches onto them if possible. Alternatively, it runs "jed."
Why not just use an editor that works in both places?
(like GNU emacs, or wpe)
>(Apparently that means I'm an Emacs person; go shoot me...)
Nah...personally, I'm an EMACS/Vi/MCEDIT/WPE kinda guy.
[SNIPped script...nifty]
>
>I use something roughly equivalent to pass URLs from the shell to
>Netscape;
Like from tty1 to Netscape? OR just from an XTerm to Netscape?
If it's the former, PLEASE share, if the latter, nevermind.
(I use X and multiple text consoles a lot, so being able to send
stuff from a console to X would be incredibly useful)
> it spawns a Netscape process if one isn't already present.
>It would doubtless be easy enough to build up more complex schemes to
>search for other web browsers that might be running.
Or, SHOULD be as easy...actaully passing info to them, however,
might not work if they don't all share some base-level of functionality.
>Not rocket science.
No...but it still seems to go againt the KISS principle.
--
"Being myself a remarkably stupid fellow, I have had to unteach myself
the difficulties, and now beg to present to my fellow fools the parts
that are not hard" --Silvanus P. Thompson, from "Calculus Made Easy."
------------------------------
From: Jeffery Cann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.os.linux.slackware
Subject: StarOffice 5.0 Filter Update?
Date: Sun, 04 Apr 1999 15:26:39 GMT
Greetings.
I downloaded Star Office 5.0 about 5 months ago. It is a good office suite,
but I disagree with their 'everything in one place' motto. IMHO this leads
to code bloat as I end up only wanting to use a single program, like the word
processor and end up loading the whole damn thing.
The main reason I tried SO is for the import/export of MS Office documents.
As any business users have noted, once a company "standardizes" on MS Office,
it is really tough to exchange documents unless you use MS Office. (Thanks,
Bill!)
SO 5.0 import/exports simple MS Office documents, but the formatting of
complicated ones is not good. I realize that the SO folks have to reverse
engineer the documents because of the proprietary - upgrade every 2 years -
mentality of MS Office.
Here's my question: Has anyone downloaded the new Star Office 5.0 Filter
Update? Star Division claims that they have "greatly improved" import/export
filters for MS Office documents. Before I waste more time on this (its a 70
MB download), I wanted some feedback. If you have downloaded the filter
update, has it improved?
Thanks.
Jeff
============= Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ============
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------------------------------
From: Ilya <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: BUS error - Netscape
Crossposted-To: comp.unix.questions
Date: 4 Apr 1999 08:41:48 +0700
I was running Netscape when it suddenly crashed! I got this message:
root@republic-p4-~>
[1] + bus error netscape
Any ideas?
Also, a few days ago, my Linux machine completely froze. /var/log/messages
didn't show anything... Any ideas what could have caused that?
Linux 2.2.1
root@republic-p4-~> netscape -v
Netscape 4.08/Export, 02-Nov-98; (c) 1995-1998 Netscape Communications Corp.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (David M. Cook)
Crossposted-To: kingston.os.linux,comp.os.linux.networking
Subject: Re: hackers
Date: Sun, 04 Apr 1999 15:05:42 GMT
On Sun, 04 Apr 1999 05:14:32 +0000, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>sudden there's another process running "make whatis". I
It's just a cronjob that runs weekly. Redhat should document these in their
manual if they don't already. I remember working with slackware at 7:45 in
the morning when the hard drive starting cranking away. I thought I'd been
hacked. That's when slack scheduled the locate database update.
Dave Cook
------------------------------
From: Kalle Olavi Niemitalo <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Modest proposal, (was: Re: hacked /bin/login: can't replace it)
Date: 04 Apr 1999 18:35:28 +0300
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (NF Stevens) writes:
> Personally I can't see any valid reason for using the immutable
> attribute on files owned by root. It provides no additional
> security since root can always override it using the chattr
> command,
The code checking whether one is allowed to change the immutable
and append-only attributes is at the beginning of
ext2_notify_change() in linux-2.2.5/fs/ext2/inode.c. It doesn't
just check for root; it calls capable(CAP_LINUX_IMMUTABLE).
capable() is an inline function defined in
linux-2.2.5/include/linux/sched.h. It checks
current->cap_effective... so by clearing the right bit from that,
one could prevent a root-owned process from changing the
immutable attribute.
linux-2.2.5/kernel/capability.c apparently implements system
calls for changing the capabilities of a process. cap_set_all()
looks particularly interesting -- one could make a program which
removes dangerous capabilities from all other processes, waits
for a password to be entered on tty1 and then forks a root shell
with full capabilities.
------------------------------
From: Peter Chant <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux,comp.os.linux.setup,comp.os.linux.networking
Subject: Re: What is the best Linux to install?
Date: Sun, 04 Apr 1999 07:09:11 -0700
==============30CEEF59DC253DC7FBE11F2E
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Mike Graham wrote:
RedHat is a nice place to start. It has all of the easy touchy feely user
interfaces that make it so easy
to use, but with all distributions, its best to know what one is doing, prior
to going in. I have read Linux Unleashed;
Unix Unleashed; Linux System Administration Handbook, Discover Linux,
etc........................... :)
In my case, I had bought a Unix book, NO LESS, that packaged BSD, as well as
some obscure distribution
called TurboLinux ( mostly marketed in Japan) < www.turbolinux.com >. also <
www.pht.com >. I have also
installed and played with SCO Unixware v.7, which is exceptionally easy to use,
but didn't have the crazy flexibility
of a Linux port!
I've tried Caldera ( I hate KDE! ) , RedHat ( seems like MS Windoze - you ever
checked out their configuration
menu - looks like an Explorer to me!!!) and finally, gone back to TurboLinux.
IMHO, TurboLinux is the most configurable
( like 10 desktops, etc ) the most games, etc.....need I say more?
Distributions aside, its important to buy one, or download one, and play with
it. Read as much as you can about
Linux and then try various configurations until you're happy.
Oh, important: until you get one of your distro's to function properly, it may
be prudent to have a dual boot
configuration, until you finally are happy with your Linux distro.
Peter.
> On Thu, 01 Apr 1999 14:27:59 +0900, Yim,SeongSoo wrote:
> >I realy recommend to start with RedHat.
>
> I agree with that. It seems the most 'mainstream'. I was just on their
> website and it appears that several big players (IBM, COMPAQ, etc.) have
> pumped in some capital to get in on the action. That's a very telling sign.
>
> --
> Mike Graham, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Caledon, Ontario, Canada (just NW of Toronto).
>
> Raiser of animals. Weldor of metals. Driver of off-road vehicles.
> Writer of FAQs. Keeper of the faith, and all around okay guy.
>
> <http://www.beeline.ca/personal/mike>
--
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// Peter Chant < [EMAIL PROTECTED]> < [EMAIL PROTECTED]> //
// .'but put your courage to the sticking place'........//
// Forced to use MS at work, qu'est que la choix?......//
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<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en">
<html>
Mike Graham wrote:
<p>RedHat is a nice place to start. It has all of the easy touchy feely
user interfaces that make it so easy
<br>to use, but with all distributions, its best to know what one is doing,
prior to going in. I have read Linux Unleashed;
<br>Unix Unleashed; Linux System Administration Handbook, Discover
Linux, etc........................... :)
<p>In my case, I had bought a Unix book, NO LESS, that packaged BSD, as
well as some obscure distribution
<br>called TurboLinux ( mostly marketed in Japan) < www.turbolinux.com
>. also < www.pht.com >. I have also
<br>installed and played with SCO Unixware v.7, which is exceptionally
easy to use, but didn't have the crazy flexibility
<br>of a Linux port!
<p>I've tried Caldera ( I hate KDE! ) , RedHat ( seems like MS Windoze
- you ever checked out their configuration
<br>menu - looks like an Explorer to me!!!) and finally, gone back to TurboLinux.
IMHO, TurboLinux is the most configurable
<br>( like 10 desktops, etc ) the most games, etc.....need I say more?
<p>Distributions aside, its important to buy one, or download one, and
play with it. Read as much as you can about
<br>Linux and then try various configurations until you're happy.
<p>Oh, important: until you get one of your distro's to function properly,
it may be prudent to have a dual boot
<br>configuration, until you finally are happy with your Linux distro.
<p>Peter.
<blockquote TYPE=CITE>On Thu, 01 Apr 1999 14:27:59 +0900, Yim,SeongSoo
wrote:
<br>>I realy recommend to start with RedHat.
<p> I agree with that. It seems the most 'mainstream'.
I was just on their
<br>website and it appears that several big players (IBM, COMPAQ, etc.)
have
<br>pumped in some capital to get in on the action. That's a very
telling sign.
<p>--
<br>Mike Graham, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
<br>Caledon, Ontario, Canada (just NW of Toronto).
<p>Raiser of animals. Weldor of metals. Driver of off-road
vehicles.
<br>Writer of FAQs. Keeper of the faith, and all around okay guy.
<p><<a
href="http://www.beeline.ca/personal/mike">http://www.beeline.ca/personal/mike</a>></blockquote>
<pre>--
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
// Peter Chant < [EMAIL PROTECTED]> < [EMAIL PROTECTED]>
//
// .'but put your courage to the sticking place'........//
// Forced to use MS at work, qu'est que la choix?......//</pre>
</html>
==============30CEEF59DC253DC7FBE11F2E==
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