Subject: Re: Symlink ownership
To: None <willett@math.utah.edu>
From: Luke Mewburn <lukem@telstra.com.au>
List: current-users
Date: 07/31/1995 14:41:48
> My vote is to fix the sticky-bit hack, so that:

>     -- A user can't make a hard link from a file he doesn't own into a
>     directory where sticky-bit access applies.

>     -- A user can't make a symbolic link in a directory where sticky-bit
>     access applies.

I disagree. In the 'bored undergraduate' environment that sticky dirs
were created for (to quote someone else on this thread ;), I often
used to extract packages or tar files in /tmp (setup as sticky)
because of quota or disk space limitations in ~. Having the OS tell
me 'ECANNOTMAKESYMLINKBECAUSEOFPOSIX' at that stage would have made me
extremely pissed.

Sure, I can hard link to a file I don't own, but if *I* hard link to a
file I *do* own I'd want to be able to remove it.

Maybe change the semantics so that a user can't hard link or sym link
to a file they don't own in a sticky dir if you really must keep this
'ownerless' concept.

However, I think that ditching the new semantics is a good idea,
UNLESS someone actually comes up with a reasonable reason why they're
needed (e.g, some braindead OS with potential POSIX aspirations can't
handle the traditional format of symlinks...)