On Mon, 15 Aug 2005 17:04, Jeff Waugh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Lindows will run your user session as root by default. This is a hideously
> bad thing to do, because it makes your entire system as vulnerable to
> attack as Win9x or Windows 2k/NT/XP (when running as Administrator, which
> seems to be very common). I fear that Linspire will make Linux look
> terrible.

I installed Hoary a little while ago, and I was surprised to find that:

1. the installer didn't ask me to define a root password
2. once installed, I discovered that the root password was the same as the 
password of the user I had created in the installation
3. the user I had created in the installation was able to change system 
settings that can normally only be changed as root
4. I could open a root terminal without typing a password

To fix the last two points I had to manually turn off "Executing system 
administration tasks" in "Users and Groups".

While I believe that Lindow^H^H^Hspire is a wart on the face of free software, 
I was shocked to see Ubuntu seemingly taking the same path. Am I missing 
something?


Disclaimer: I am an admin with the PCLinuxOS project, but I really like Ubuntu 
as well.

-- 
Sridhar Dhanapalan  [Yama | http://www.pclinuxonline.com/]
  {GnuPG/OpenPGP: http://dhanapalan.webhop.net/yama.asc
   0x049D38B4 : A7A9 8A02 78CB AB1B FCE4 EEC6 2DD9 249B 049D 38B4}

"Spyware creators have been taking advantage of gaping holes in IE's security 
model, allowing them to install NT services and OS extensions through the IE 
auto-install functionality. This is the primary reason I use FireFox rather 
than IE; I don't care about things like tabbed browsing so much, but I do 
like to know that my web browser does not have permission to modify the OS."
                -- Microsoft Channel9 Wiki, July 2004

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