Mail Archives: cygwin/2007/07/16/13:21:58
I remember an extensive discussion about the purpose MD5 sums serve for
the cygwin installer[1] some time ago.
My understanding (synopsis) of the thread (before I gave up reading it in
disgust somewhere around Christopher Faylor's suggestion that the subject
be dropped :} ) was that md5sum is only used to indicate that a particular
package had been completely downloaded (someone correct me if I
misunderstood, please). If that is the case, then it seems to me to be a
bit quick to declare a server or package compromised based on a mismatch
of md5 sums.
I do think that instead of simply aborting the install with a message that
the server was compromised (was it? or is something else going on?), that
a more useful option would be to allow the user to select a different
mirror and continue the process.
--
William Sutton
[1] http://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2007-05/threads.html#00314
On Mon, 16 Jul 2007, Louis Kruger wrote:
> >
> > On Mon, Jul 16, 2007 at 10:30:52AM -0500, Louis Kruger wrote:
> > > I also have a complaint: the dialog that notifies the user of the failed
> > > MD5 is not well designed. The dialog asks "Do you want to skip the
> > > package?" and has a yes and no button. I read it quickly and pressed no
> > > before thinking about it, the package went ahead and tried to install. I
> > > think there should be a little more effort to restrain the user from
> > > performing a dangerous action such as installing a package with a wrong MD5.
> >
> > Good point. The message should probably be
> >
> > Do you want to not skip the package (No/Yes)?
> >
> > cgf
>
> I realize you are joking, but the wording of the message is beside the
> point. For an ordinary end-user, installing a file with a wrong MD5 is
> the wrong (and dangerous) thing to do in just about any case I can think
> of. Therefore it should not be equally easy to select either option.
>
> My opinion is that the setup program should abort immediately on
> detecting a wrong MD5 with a message that the server may have been
> compromised. If there is a special case where someone may actually want
> this, it should be something non-obvious, like a -allow-wrong-md5 flag
> to the setup program.
>
> thanks,
> Louis
>
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