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From: allbery@ncoast.UUCP (Brandon Allbery)
Newsgroups: comp.bugs.sys5
Subject: Re: Re: weird bug with passwd and /dev/syscon
Message-ID: <4999@ncoast.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 2-Nov-87 21:01:41 EST
Article-I.D.: ncoast.4999
Posted: Mon Nov  2 21:01:41 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 7-Nov-87 09:16:44 EST
References: <298@boole.acc.virginia.edu> <260@slxsys.co.uk> <538@ambush.UUCP>
Reply-To: allbery@ncoast.UUCP (Brandon Allbery)
Followup-To: comp.bugs.sys5
Organization: Cleveland Public Access UN*X, Cleveland, Oh
Lines: 37

As quoted from <538@ambush.UUCP> by kimcm@ambush.UUCP (Kim Chr. Madsen):
+---------------
| In article <260@slxsys.co.uk> jpp@slxsys.co.uk (John Pettitt) writes:
| >",.." in /etc/passwd ! I hope you dont allow dial'ins now you have told
| >the world !
| 
| That is ridiculous all password fields under 13 characters are void -
+---------------

Yes, Kim, All the World is a Vax Running 4.3BSD....

We are talking about UNIX SYSTEM V.  Not BSD.

UNIX SYSTEM V has a system called "password aging".  "login" and "su" both
know that a 13-character encrypted password may optionally be followed by
a comma and two or four characters from the set [A-Za-z0-9/.].  The first
two characters indicate the maximum time between password changes; the other
two represent the date of the last password change.  The two-letter values
are weeks encoded in base 64 via the library routines a64l() and l64a().

Please excuse the tone of this message, but I'm mighty SICK of BSD types
posting on the net that something in System V but not in BSD OBVIOUSLY
DOES NOT EXIST AT ALL because it's not in BSD.

Come off it.  I don't go around posting snide remarks about how System V
is "obviously superior".  Why should you ("you" meaning collectively all
the BSD'ers who so post).  [I'll let you in on a secret:  NEITHER is perfect.
System V has stuff that BSD needs badly; on the other hand, job control
would be mighty handy under System V.  And symlinks are a good example of
a no-win:  System V doesn't have them, but they are handy; BSD has them,
but they're capable of causing major (and minor) problems.  A whole month
of Usenet brainstorming came up with no real solution.  Conclusion:  both
need work.  Don't glorify what ain't glorious.]
-- 
Brandon S. Allbery		     necntc!ncoast!allbery@harvard.harvard.edu
 {harvard!necntc,well!hoptoad,sun!mandrill!hal,uunet!hnsurg3}!ncoast!allbery
"Uncle _who_?" -- Lt. Worf		       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ NOTE NEW PATH!