On Thu 07 Dec 2006 11:13:59 NZDT +1300, Steve Holdoway wrote: > > There > > isn't much choice for the filename here, in any case, I'm feeding md5sum its > > own output. > > > Ah, so you're testing md5sum against itself? Pretty pointless. Silly > me thought you were testing against a delivered md5sum.
That's not constructive Steve. The purpose of a checksumming tool is to safeguard some data by means of a checksum. After initially creating the checksum, the integrity of the data can afterwards be verified by checking whether the sum still matches the data. It's actually smart to see whether the tool can process its own output and get the same result a second time - otherwise step 2 of the reason one uses the tool in the first place (verify data integrity) isn't going to happen. This puts the whole tool in question of course. Debian's el-cheapo version of md5sum fails this test. I can't be bothered to show you the exact steps and outputs of both of the md5sum programs under discussion because I have mostly already done so, and I know you're capable of seeing much easier for yourself. Volker -- Volker Kuhlmann is list0570 with the domain in header http://volker.dnsalias.net/ Please do not CC list postings to me.
