[cfarm-users] Future of cfarm186/cfarm187/cfarm188 at OSUOSL

[Collin Funk]

Peter Gutmann via cfarm-users <cfarm-users at lists.tetaneutral.net>
writes:

> Jeffrey Walton via cfarm-users <cfarm-users at lists.tetaneutral.net> writes:
>
>>First, Hurd lacks PATH_MAX and friends, and it is a surprise to some program
>>authors, and a pain in the butt for package maintainers and porters.  Also see
>><https://www.gnu.org/software/hurd/community/gsoc/project_ideas/maxpath.html>.
>
> That's Gnu all over:
>
>   Systems only should define them if they actually have such fixed limits (see
>   limits.h). The Hurd, following the GNU Coding Standards, tries to avoid this
>   kind of arbitrary limits, and consequently doesn't define the macros.
>
> Translated, "we're special, and we're going to let everyone know we're special
> by making sure their code breaks".
>
>   Fixing these issues usually boils down to replacing char foo[PATH_MAX] by
>   char *foo, and using dynamic memory allocation, i.e. e.g. a loop that tries
>   geometrically growing sizes.
>
> Has anyone ever explored how many ways you can DoS the Hurd by exploiting this
> no-limits-anywhere practice?

You can create paths much longer than PATH_MAX on many systems.

Collin