Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cbmvax!rutgers!mit-eddie!bbn!rochester!pt.cs.cmu.edu!cadre!pitt!cisunx!ejkst
From: ejkst@cisunx.UUCP (Eric J. Kennedy)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Enhancer 1.3 package
Message-ID: <13526@cisunx.UUCP>
Date: 5 Nov 88 01:00:46 GMT
References: <12839@eecae.UUCP> <6531@xanth.cs.odu.edu> <622@quintus.UUCP> <5053@thorin.cs.unc.edu> <0XQTTpy00UkaICgRhk@andrew.cmu.edu>
Reply-To: ejkst@unix.cis.pittsburgh.edu (Eric J. Kennedy)
Organization: Univ. of Pittsburgh, Comp & Info Sys
Lines: 31

In article <0XQTTpy00UkaICgRhk@andrew.cmu.edu> bader+@andrew.cmu.edu (Miles Bader) writes:
>bell@unc.cs.unc.edu (Andrew Bell) writes:
>> Aren't you going to have incredibly horrible virus problems if you do this
>> sort of thing?  A malicious program could infect your machine to the point
>> that you couldn't disinfect it yourself.

>You could make the eeproms have a write lock that get's flipped to
>"writeable" only by some button you use (in conjunction with power
>up) to load new releases.  Since it's very, very, very unlikely that
>a "kickstart" type disk would become infected (because it's always
>used before there's any other software loaded, so there can't be any
>viruses waiting around), this would basically make a virus in your
>kernel impossible.

Really?  How about "Introducing 'nifty-patch'!  This program will make a
small patch to your kickstart disk which makes it possible to (insert
favorite nifty thing here).  Simply run 'nifty-patch' and insert
kickstart disk when requested."  This apparently mild-mannered program
then proceeds to infect your kickstart.

There are already several kickstart patch programs floating around.
(For 1.2, mostly, but I have no doubt that they will be updated for 1.3,
1.4, etc.)  NoKLICKstart, sumkick, kickbench, and something that lets you
change the workbench disk prompt.  And probably some I haven't heard
of.

-- 
                       +-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+    Did you know that the 
Eric Kennedy           | Bush   &        |    Soviets would rather
ejkst@cisunx.UUCP      | Bentsen  '88 !! |    Reagan be president than
                       +-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+    either Bush or Dukakis?