Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!uwm.edu!rpi!masscomp!andyo From: andyo@glasperl.masscomp (Andy Oram) Newsgroups: comp.unix.misc Subject: Re: Protection from "rm *" (summary) Message-ID: Date: 8 Oct 90 20:13:22 GMT References: <857@agcsun.UUCP> Sender: news@masscomp.ccur.com Distribution: usa Organization: Concurrent Computer Corporation - Westford, Ma Lines: 39 In-reply-to: jackm@agcsun.UUCP's message of 8 Oct 90 16:27:53 GMT I didn't want to jump in and be a wet blanket, because this thread turned up some neat tricks, but I don't think nobody has mentioned this yet -- really, a rogue rm command is the least of your worries. I myself am much more likely to wipe out my work by: Moving a file to a directory that already has a file with the same name (yes, I know that mv and cp have -i too, but you can spend your life disabling utilities' standard practices). Writing out a file that I've munged, or where I accidentally deleted 90% without realizing it, because the part that showed up on my screen looked fine. Getting "make" confused and having it think your source is a target, and removing it because an error occurred. etc., etc. So let me act like a school-marm for just a moment, and say that the minimal protection you need is the classic protection: daily back-ups and source control. The most state-of-the-art solution I know of would be version control, like Emacs implements for edited files, and like a certain operating system I dare not mention without being laughed at implements across the whole system. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Andrew Oram Concurrent Computer Corporation (I don't represent Concurrent; this message represents my own opinion) Digital Communications Route: andyo@westford.ccur.com {harvard,uunet,petsd}!masscomp!andyo Analog Communications Route: (508) 392-2865 Automatic UN*X documentation utility: cref | compress | crypt | man -------------------------------------------------------------------------------