Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!uunet!amdahl!ubvax!vsi1!wyse!td2cad!mipos3!nate
From: nate@mipos2.intel.com (Nate Hess)
Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.bug
Subject: Re: chmod 777
Keywords: copyleft
Message-ID: <3228@mipos3.intel.com>
Date: 23 Nov 88 17:45:55 GMT
References: <8811142028.AA00709@sugar-bombs.ai.mit.edu> <3412@ttidca.TTI.COM>
Sender: news@mipos3.intel.com
Reply-To: woodstock@sc.intel.com (Nate Hess)
Distribution: gnu
Organization: Intel Corporation, Santa Clara, CA
Lines: 46
In-reply-to: mb@ttidca.TTI.COM (Michael Bloom)

In article <3412@ttidca.TTI.COM>, mb@ttidca (Michael Bloom) writes:
>	rms@WHEATIES.AI.MIT.EDU (Richard Stallman) writes:
>  >  I do not believe it is a good thing to have security among the users
>  >  of a computer system.  If I were to distribute files that set the mode
>  >  to something other than 777, I would in effect be promoting the practice
>  >  that I do not approve of.  Therefore, I don't do it.

>Perhaps then, the gnu emacs license should state that setting the mode to
>0777 is required, and using any other setting will revoke that instance of the
>license. 

I don't get the impression that that's what RMS is saying, at all.  He's
not requiring that the emacs executable be 'chmod'ed to 777; rather he's
saying that it would violate his ethical principles to distribute Emacs
with anything other than protection bits of 777.  Once you get your copy
of the Emacs distribution, you're free to change the 777 to whatever you
wish.  RMS obviously can't "require" that you set the mode to anything.

>Is the making of such policy decisions for sites using emacs in line
>with FSF's goals? If not, does it weaken FSF's message? 
>I personally tend to think that it does, and that such installation
>site policy be left to the discretion of the site manager, not
>dictated by the makefile.

Well, "installation site policy" *is* left up to the site manager;
anyone installing software who doesn't read through the makefile they're
going to be using before typing "make" will have Emacs installed with
whatever conventions the creator of the makefile deemed correct/best.
It's the installer's responsibility to double check and make sure that
those conventions match his/her own.

>Likely 99.999% of sites installing emacs are turning off public write access
>following installation. At a single site, this is a trivial amount of time
>spent, but it is nonetheless extra work that is being performed at many
>thousands of sites. 

It's no extra work at this site, since I don't use the top-level
Makefile.  If I was using it, however, you can bet I'd read through it,
or at least do a "make -n", before running "make".

--woodstock
--
	   "What I like is when you're looking and thinking and looking
	   and thinking...and suddenly you wake up."   - Hobbes

woodstock@sc.intel.com    ...!{decwrl|hplabs!oliveb|amd}!intelca!mipos3!nate