[ale] Stoopid Noobs

Byron A Jeff byron at cc.gatech.edu
Thu Jun 15 20:57:18 EDT 2006


On Thu, Jun 15, 2006 at 08:14:10PM -0400, Christopher Fowler wrote:
> Lets get another thread going.
> 
> When I first did Linux in the early 90s I needed to copy a file from
> Linux to Windows.  /dev/hda1 was Windows partition.  Here is how I did
> it:
> 
> cat file > /dev/hda1

Ouch.

> My next step was to reinstall Win 3.11 and then load my backup off of
> floppy tape.  Never tried that again.

Now the post mortem. The stupidity was not in trying to copy the file.
The stupidity was in the fact that it succeeded. So that means you had
to be logged in a root.

Yet another reason to take care doing root activities.

I have mine of course. Try the difference between

rm -rf / tmp

and the intended

rm -rf /tmp

That one required a reinstall too. Ouch. Even worse I thought I knew
what I was doing so I was root on purpose, not out of ignorance.

BAJ



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