[ale] Which /etc/services to allow for secure web browsing & email ?

[Michael H. Warfield]

On Sat, 2008-12-20 at 11:48 -0500, Courtney Thomas wrote:
> My services file has thousands of entries. I assume those
> without # at the beginning are enabled.

	No.  Not correct.  /etc/services is merely a lookup file mapping
service names to well known port numbers and protocols.  It, in and of
itself, doesn't enable anything.  Sort of like what the /etc/hosts file
does for looking up systems.

> What I was thinking was to make a copy of it and edit out almost everything 
> or
> possibly better yet,.... create a new minimized one rather than trying to 
> digest
> the myriad entries .

> What minimum should remain to permit secure web browsing and email  ?

	Highly recommended that you do not go down this road or every service
that uses getservicebyname() may potentially be broken.  Do not do this.

> What services am I overlooking with this idea that would possibly be a 
> mistake  ?

	The file doesn't do what you think it does therefore you don't
understand the function of the file thus making tampering with it a
mistake.

> Appreciatively,

> Courtney 

	Mike
-- 
Michael H. Warfield (AI4NB) | (770) 985-6132 |  mhw at WittsEnd.com
   /\/\|=mhw=|\/\/          | (678) 463-0932 |  http://www.wittsend.com/mhw/
   NIC whois: MHW9          | An optimist believes we live in the best of all
 PGP Key: 0xDF1DD471        | possible worlds.  A pessimist is sure of it!

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 307 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
Url : http://mail.ale.org/pipermail/ale/attachments/20081220/a21d524b/attachment.bin