Re: sync(1) not really syncing??

["Steven M. Bellovin" <smb%cs.columbia.edu@localhost>]

On Thu, 11 Sep 2008 14:52:02 +0200
Jonathan Schleifer <js-netbsd-users%webkeks.org@localhost> wrote:

> Please read again what I wrote. I said it's NOT like that atm, but
> the OP proposed to stall the whole system when you type sync. And
> that *WOULD* _DEFINITELY_ allow for a DoS, if that change would be
> made. It can be a blocking syscall, that's ok, but NEVER block the
> whole system  
> - that's not acceptable, but what the OP suggested.

If there's no better way to do it, we could always require root
privileges to run sync(); it's not a normal user system call -- users
would generally want fsync() instead.

Let's see if we can solve the real problem -- this is a decades-old
gripe/deficiency.

                --Steve Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb