On Mon, Mar 24, 2008 at 10:32 AM, James Hawkins <truiken@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > On 3/24/08, Mark Knecht <markknecht@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > On Mon, Mar 24, 2008 at 9:50 AM, Paul Johnson <baloo@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > > > Hash: SHA1 > > > > > > On Monday 24 March 2008 03:47:59 am Timeout wrote: > > > > > > > Can't you simply start by not allowing uncontrolled connexions to the > > > > Internet (like adding an offline-modus in winecfg instead on blocking the > > > > root)? > > > > > > What reason would one EVER need to run end-user software as root in the first > > > place? Wine or not, that's just terrible practice. > > > > > > > In Linux I agree. In Windows there is lots of software that requires > > folks to install and/or run as administrator. I sometimes suspect that > > some Wine users, nebies mostly, get confused about the difference > > between the two. > > > > I would personally *never* run Wine as root. About the only thing I > > run as root on my systems are the programs to install software, > > nothing else, at least in a terminal, etc. > > > > As much as I like Wine I am even concerned about running it in my > > regular user account as it seems to me someone could write a Windows > > program that then erases all my Linux user files, etc. > > > > There's nothing special about Wine. Someone can also write a Linux > program that erases all your user files. > Completely true, but I get my programs from Gentoo's portage and do not run testing versions so unless someone is pretty tricky about hiding their intentions or the validation process runs afoul I figure I'm relatively safe. On the other hand I fully expect that one day someone with a chip on the shoulder in the Windows world will start writing programs specifically aimed at hurting the Open Source world. It will be a sad day if something like that happens. Maybe it already has an I just haven't heard... Best to be safe and do regular backups. Thanks, Mark
