Constructing a time structure(linked to directory structure)
Andre Speelmans
andre at as.no-ip.com
Wed Aug 25 14:52:17 UTC 2004
On Wed, Aug 25, 2004 at 01:11:03PM +0100, James Wilkinson wrote:
> meetkaustubhghosh at vsnl.net wrote:
> >
> > Let us consider a
> > situation where a employee is to complete a report within a date .He
> > didnot send it ,but later he just shifts the system date backwords,
> > saves the file in the backward date and shows that he has completed
> > the job in time.
>
> Or, more simply, he just uses the touch command. This doesn't even need
> root access.
>
> Andre Speelmans commented:
> >
> > Clearly you don't trust the user. I assume it is required for him to have the
> > privileges to change the date on the system (if he doesn't need them, strip
> > them and your problem is solved).
>
> Well ... no. Not unless you can stop him from running touch or something
> like it. (Careful review of permissions, filesystems, and the noexec
> keyword can make this practical. But it's still not a good idea.)
<ashamed>
I didn't even think of touch. Stupid, stupid....
</ashamed>
> > If you don't trust the user, why not change your procedure so that a report is
> > completed when it is on the system *and* he has notified his manager. His
> > manager can verify the existance of the report.
>
> Or when he has sent it by e-mail to his manager.
E-mail doesn't have a guaranteed delivery. It is quite easy to say: I did send
it, probably something wrong with the mail-server.
> Does it really matter if the report isn't completed by a point in time
> if the manager only looks at it later and it's finished then?
IMHO: no. But the OP did specifically mention it should be completed at a
certain date.
> If no-one looks at a report, does it really exist?
Is a sound really a sound if there is nobody to hear it?
--
Kind regards,
Andre
More information about the fedora-list
mailing list