Re: etc/passwd file

From: Nick Maclaren (nmm1@cus.cam.ac.uk)
Date: 10/29/02 

From: nmm1@cus.cam.ac.uk (Nick Maclaren)
Date: 29 Oct 2002 20:10:49 GMT

In article <apm9g5$k53$1@aquila.mdx.ac.uk>,
David Webb <david20@alpha2.mdx.ac.uk> wrote:
>
>Since it could have been easily fixed if they had been aware of the problem
>then as I said before this was a bad design decision. I'm not blaming them
>- Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson were not designing an OS which was meant to
>be secure and last for 30+ years.

For heaven's sake! Bill Unruh has explained why it was done, and I
have explained why it was an appropriate decision for the projected
lifetime of the Unix system (and then some). So why do you claim
it was a bad design decision?

Have you ever designed software systems for a lifetime of 20 years
and had them in heavy, active use 30 years later? Well, I have,
and you may well have used my design and code. But it is showing
its age, for precisely the same reasons - computers are much faster
than I estimated that they would be at the end of its lifetime.

Regards,
Nick Maclaren,
University of Cambridge Computing Service,
New Museums Site, Pembroke Street, Cambridge CB2 3QH, England.
Email: nmm1@cam.ac.uk
Tel.: +44 1223 334761 Fax: +44 1223 334679

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