strange man behavior

From: Ron Sweeney (sween@modelm.org)
Date: 08/12/02 

Date: Mon, 12 Aug 2002 12:34:20 -0400 (EDT)
From: Ron Sweeney <sween@modelm.org>
To: vuln-dev@securityfocus.com

sween@attaway:~$ man -V
man, version 2.3.20, 07 September 2001
sween@attaway:~$ uname -a
Linux attaway 2.2.20 #1 Sat Apr 20 11:45:28 EST 2002 i586 unknown

sween@attaway:~$ man /dev/random
Reformatting random, please wait...

man: command exited with status 2: /usr/bin/zsoelim /dev/random |
/usr/bin/tbl | /usr/bin/nroff -mandoc -Tlatin1 | exec /usr/bin/pager -s

more weirdness with other binaries, /bin/sh and /dev/urandom...

not sure what to think of this yet...exploitable?

this condition does ! exist on FreeBSD, HPUX or Solaris.

*shrug*

your thoughts?

 --- -sween
| M | http://www.modelm.org
 --- "TYPE HARD OR GO HOME." | US Patent, US4118611

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