Subject: Re: DEC uses NetBSD
To: None <mouse@Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA>
From: Phil Nelson <phil@cs.wwu.edu>
List: current-users
Date: 03/20/1997 10:01:49
>The only binaries I don't have source to
>on my machine are the ROMs on the CPU board!

Very similar to my pc532, except I do have source for my ROM monitor and
the PAL equations for my hardware!  I even did some of the programming
for my ROM monitor!   :)

Actually, I do understand where you are comming from.  You would not have
to get and use the pre-compiled packages.   But there are a lot of people
who would benefit from pre-compiled packages, and just because I may not
want to use them, I'd like to see them available.  

>... cleaning up after someone slips you a trojaned something-or-other
>and waltzes through the resulting hole, leaving muddy footprints all
>over your system.

This can happen even if I get source code off the net.  I don't have
time to read every line of code before I compile and install it.
There are tools that allow one, at minimum, to "guarantee" that one
has the identical bits that the creator of the pre-compiled package
put in there.  For those who want the binary packages without having
to be sure that they didn't get messed up on the net, there could
be CDROM distributions.

For most users (if not developers),  there is a lot of faith that
the developers of NetBSD are not making un-trusted software.  I doubt that
there is any ONE person connected with the NetBSD project that has
read EVERY line of source code in the /usr/src tree.  I know I haven't
come close!  I would guess I may have read less than 1%. :)

For me, having most of the "extra" programs in an easily accessible source
tree would be a great help to me.  It could save me a lot of time getting
them from their scattered locations around the network.

-- 
Phil Nelson                       NetBSD: http://www.netbsd.org
e-mail: phil@cs.wwu.edu           LPF: http://www.lpf.org
http://www.cs.wwu.edu/~phil       !gifs: http://www.lpf.org/Patent/Gif/Gif.html