>>>>> "Theodore" == Theodore Ts'o <tytso@MIT.EDU> writes:
Theodore> In any case, given the average intelligence of the
Theodore> average Linux administrator, the more safety checks we
Theodore> can add, the better. The bottom line is no, I don't
Theodore> trust the administrator, and so being able to force them
Theodore> to read the (F******) man page to find out how to
Theodore> disable the safety check is a good thing.
OK. From a usability standpoint, I think either the safety check is
important enough that it should always be on or the use cases where
the safety checks are annoying are common enough that it should never
be on. Doing anything else seems a lot like not understanding your
users' needs well enough to set reasonable defaults and complicating
your software instead of doing market research.
I'm not really seeing anyone screaming for the future, and at least
one person has indicated they like the current upstream behavior. The
next version of PAM for Debian will drop the local patch to allow
symlinks. If I get user complaints I'll probably bring the issue up
here arguing that the upstream behavior should allow symlinks.
--Sam
