Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 01:13:36 -0600 From: Wes Peters <wes@softweyr.com> To: Drew Derbyshire <ahd@kew.com> Cc: freebsd-security@freebsd.org Subject: Re: sysinstall DOESN'T ASK, dangerous defaults! Message-ID: <39CC5820.27C06E6F@softweyr.com> References: <39CB4C42.1A59669C@kew.com>
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Drew Derbyshire wrote:
>
> > Neil Blakey-Milner wrote:
> > Brett, did it ever occur to you THESE ARE THE DEFAULTS because MOST
> > PEOPLE WANT THEM THAT WAY?
>
> Did you take a survey?
Yes. The lack of complaints from anybody other than Brett Glass constitutes
our unofficial, non-scientific survey.
> > Most people who install FreeBSD just want telnet, mail, and NFS to work,
>
> Most people also want a secure system. Don't even get me started about
> rlogin/rsh being on by default in /etc/inetd.conf.
Most people wouldn't know a secure system if it bit them in the nose.
> IMHO, many people wouldn't know NFS if it bit them in the nose.
Funny, every place I've worked for the past 15 years has used NFS quite
extensively. Oh, but then, I've been working in UNIX shops for quite
some time.
> If an NFS startup is enabled and the associated required portmap server is
> not, then a improved RC script can override the setting and start portmap
> automatically (with a suitable nasty warning to console and/or log).
> Turning in portmap by default because someone MAY want NFS is not suitable.
You seem to assume nothing in the world other than NFS uses portmapper.
> > they don't want to spend hours agonizing over the configuration of every
> > single computer they install. They rely on firewalls, prayer, or abject
> > cluelessness to secure their systems, and that's just fine.
>
> God looks after fools and small children. Despise appearances, naive
> system admins don't officially qualify for "fool" status, so the OS
> developers need to step in for God.
No, they don't. I don't suppose you've ever heard the phrase "mechanism,
not policy" have you?
> Like others, I would prefer mail was left disabled or prompted for:
Fine, you and "others" can disable it yourself. If your requirements are
really that different, you should learn how to create your own release,
but keep out of the default install because it really does work for most
people.
> In summary, if the install is going to prompt for network services, it
> needs to prompt consistently. Prompting for many of the services and not
> others makes one feel like that the job is done, and it's not.
So put your code where you mouth is and submit some patches. I don't think
anyone hold anything against making sysinstall more flexible, just against
buggering the default installation into something that doesn't work out of
the box for most users. Who DO, by the way, expect telnet and mail to work.
--
"Where am I, and what am I doing in this handbasket?"
Wes Peters Softweyr LLC
wes@softweyr.com http://softweyr.com/
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