[ale] Well, this does nothing for the reputation of Linux

Mon Jul 22 11:36:44 EDT 2013

And, hijacking the thread, spring boarding from Jim's post..."Cars are bad
because there are dumb drivers. The solution is to get rid of the drivers.
A system whose failure causes human tragedy should be fixed."

That problem IS being addressed:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324399404578585471713734296.html?KEYWORDS=horsless+carriages+driverless+cars

On Mon, Jul 22, 2013 at 11:03 AM, Jim Kinney <jim.kinney at gmail.com> wrote:

> Cars are bad because there are dumb drivers. The solution is to get rid of
> the drivers. A system whose failure causes human tragedy should be fixed.
>
>
> On Mon, Jul 22, 2013 at 9:54 AM, leam hall <leamhall at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Ah, so you're saying that cars are bad because there are dumb drivers
>> that can't replace an engine?
>>
>> Is there bad code written in PHP? Sure. Same for Python, Perl,
>> C(++/sharp) etc. Don't blame the language for the users.
>>
>> Leam
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Jul 22, 2013 at 9:47 AM, Michael B. Trausch <mbt at naunetcorp.com>wrote:
>>
>>>  On 07/21/2013 04:44 PM, Andy Borgmann wrote:
>>>
>>> Where do you see this being a PHP non-security.  It sounds like it was
>>> an updated version of vBulletin's admin panel that had a security flaw.
>>>  Even if vBulletin is coded in PHP, I don't see why blaming PHP as a whole
>>> is warranted in this case and not just vBulletin.  PHP seems secure enough
>>> or Facebook.
>>>
>>>
>>> Some points:
>>>
>>>    1. Facebook does not run the official PHP, they run a subset of it
>>>    that is then compiled, if memory serves, to C++ and then compiled to system
>>>    code.
>>>    2. PHP itself is insecure for *many* reasons, the least of which:
>>>       1. PHP has never deprecated functionality that is known-unsafe,
>>>       given the average experience of the PHP-only programmer; for example, SQL
>>>       injection attacks are pandemic in PHP code not because it's any less safe
>>>       than C, but because it is just as safe as C and PHP-only programmers don't
>>>       have perspective from which to draw from to secure their own code.  This
>>>       flaw could be fixed in PHP by removing functions that permit it; in my
>>>       book, that makes it a PHP flaw (it's easier to fix PHP than it would be to
>>>       fix all PHP programmers).
>>>       2. PHP has a large number of pseudoprogrammers that work with
>>>       it.  These people are mostly management types that found that they can
>>>       quickly piece together a PHP script and make it do something useful.  These
>>>       people have no background in security, information technology, information
>>>       systems or any similar such topic.  They often C&P pathologically, and the
>>>       systems that they create are swiss cheese from a security perspective.
>>>       Again, this is something that can be fixed in PHP, by ensuring that
>>>       variables that come from the user are always represented in a canonical
>>>       format and that outputs are properly escaped.
>>>       3. PHP has a large number of what I call "auto-fsck-you" features
>>>       built-in to it that most people do not understand.  One such example is
>>>       PHP's associative arrays, which are really integer arrays. The reason that
>>>       integers and string keys can both be used in PHP in the same array is that
>>>       they share the same namespace; a very large sequential array is quite
>>>       likely to clash with the hashed namespace used for string keys.  Fun, yes?
>>>       And that's just one example.
>>>
>>> I could go on for pages, but there are many others who have done so at
>>> length; I won't reinvent the wheel here.  I can say, though, that a quick
>>> review of US-CERT data shows that PHP and applications written in it are
>>> still among the most common of security problems—even in systems written by
>>> professional programmers.
>>>  --
>>>   [image: Naunet Corporation Logo]  Michael B. Trausch
>>>
>>> President, *Naunet Corporation*
>>> ☎ (678) 287-0693 x130 or (888) 494-5810 x130
>>>
>>>
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>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Mind on a Mission <http://leamhall.blogspot.com/>
>>
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>>
>
>
> --
> --
> James P. Kinney III
> *
> *Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail. What you
> gain at one end you lose at the other. It's like feeding a dog on his own
> tail. It won't fatten the dog.
> - Speech 11/23/1900 Mark Twain
> *
> http://electjimkinney.org
> http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/
> *
>
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