Re: Does anyone really use emacs in terminal?

[Bob Proulx]

Stefan Monnier wrote:
> Bob Proulx wrote:
> > But emacs will always ask you if it should proceed due to that issue.
> > It will never do it automatically.  It isn't intrinsically insecure.
> 
> Well, that depends how paranoid you are.  It used to be intrinsically
> insecure (only prompting the user for things known to be dicey) and has
> been improved over the years (always prompting unless told that it's
> safe), but there are so many variables marked as "safe" that might be
> used in unexpected ways by so many packages that "intrinsically secure"
> sounds naive.

I didn't say "intrinsically secure".  I said, "It isn't intrinsically INsecure."
Which isn't the same thing.  A couple of quotes come to mind.

  "It is hard to make things foolproof because fools are so clever."

  "You can make things foolproof.  But you can't make them damn foolproof."

:-)

> More specifically, I'd be *very* surprised if there aren't any "big
> security holes" waiting to be exploited in Emacs.

Show me the bug report.  Unless there is a bug report on *something*,
anything, then I call shenanigans and say it is nothing but spreading
FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt).  Because just using the computer is a
security hole.

Which reminds me of another posting.  There is only one truly secure
computer system.

  http://www.ranum.com/security/computer_security/papers/a1-firewall/index.html

>         Stefan "who uses Zile when running as root"

I don't know.  I heard on the Internet that Zile has security
vulnerabilities.  (Part of the FUD, counter-FUD, campaign.  I really
don't have anything against Zile.)

Bob