davido@gordon.UUCP (07/09/87)
Well, I admit it. I'm responsible for the mass of postings that went out
on 7/6/87 in soc.singles and then a few more bogus ones to news.config.
Actually, it was the result of some software that had been developed here
to allow bidirectional flow of news via our DECnet mail system. We have
a multitude of VMS machines here and one Ultrix machine running DECnet/Ultrix.
The software that blew up was a couple of shell scripts that allowed news
to be mailed to everyone on our VMS machines and that allowed VMS users
to post news via mail. The system had been in use for about a month before
this problem showed up. For the first time, someone replied (via mail) to
an article generated using this system. The article got caught in an infinite
loop in this newsmail gateway. Fifty or so articles (1.3MB) got out before
the loop was stopped.
I didn't fully understand the cause until a few days later. That's when,
after some help and suggestions from Jeff Janock (jeff@necntc - thanks, jeff)
I managed to get cancels out for, I hope, all of these articles.
I'm sorry for all this trouble. I did test the system locally for over a
week before hooking it up to the outside world. I just didn't check this
part out as fully as I might have.
The gateway is now temporarily disabled until I am completely sure that this
won't happen again.
I don't 100% understand the details of what caused the problem and plan to
make a subsequent posting to news.config about what I was trying to do
and how I was doing it. At that time I'll thank you all for you constructive
suggests. Until that time (and I guess for a little while after), I'll await
your inflamatory (sp?) and destructive flames. Thanks, though, to the 5
folks that sent me mail about this - all mail was pleasant and constructive.
Embarrased,
me
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
David Ornstein "Never join a religion that has a water slide."
Internet: davido@gordon.uucp
UUCP: {mit-eddie|seismo}!mirror!gordon!davido
or {harvard|ames|decvax|husc6}!necntc!davido
US Snail: Access Technology, 6 Pleasant St, Natck MA 01760
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------melanie@houxa.UUCP (07/10/87)
In article <425@gordon.UUCP>, davido@gordon.UUCP (David Ornstein) writes: > Well, I admit it. I'm responsible for the mass of postings that went out > on 7/6/87 in soc.singles and then a few more bogus ones to news.config. > Hey David?? How long can you tread water?? :-) melanie [up da crick without a paddle (makes no sense)] lee
lab@gordon.UUCP (07/10/87)
I just want to publicly thank David for swallowing his pride, and
posting the heavy duty apology that he did. It took a lot of guts
to open himself up, and take the responsibility for the problem
that happened here. I would like to take back my suggestion about
burning him at the stake. (Sorry, Melanie).
I know that this was not an easy thing for David to do. David is
a very good programmer, and to come out and accept responsibility
was a very brave thing to do. I'm very proud of you, David.
It would have been very easy for David to remain silent, and just
not posted for a while, but he didn't. A question to the rest of us:
If this happened to you, would you own up to it. I think that
I would have a great deal of trouble with telling everyone that I
wrote a problem that had a bug in it that sent 1.3 meg to soc.singles.
I think I would ungracefully type "U" the next time I rn'ed, and stay
away for a while. What about you?
--
****************************************************************************
| "You may say I'm a dreamer, Laurie |
| but I'm not the only one." Access Technology, Inc. |
| -John Lennon uucp: husc6!necntc!gordon!lab |
****************************************************************************matt@oddjob.UChicago.EDU (Matt Crawford) (07/10/87)
In article <426@gordon.UUCP> lab@gordon.UUCP (Laurie) writes:
) A question to the rest of us:
) If this happened to you, would you own up to it.
Tell ya what - I'll post my own 1.3 Megs of garbage and then
own up to it, just to prove I'm as cool as he. (Isn't one
big pile better than two little piles? :-)
Matt
(Better yet, I'll just mail the 1.3 Megs to Laura Creighton,
since she believes that mailboxes are a place to put garbage.)lindsay@dscatl.UUCP (G.L. Cleveland [Lindsay]) (07/14/87)
In article <425@gordon.UUCP>, davido@gordon.UUCP (David Ornstein) writes: > Well, I admit it. I'm responsible for the mass of postings that went out > on 7/6/87 in soc.singles and then a few more bogus ones to news.config. > > [ details about the problem ] In these days of flame and be blamed, Gordon takes quite a risk in being so open about the problem. But I for one would say that he did us all a service in detailing the problem and passing it along to the rest of the network. Nice going, Gordon. (Those of us with bug-free code may cast the first stones!) Cheers, Lindsay Lindsay Cleveland Digital Systems Co. Atlanta, Ga gatech!dscatl!lindsay (404) 497-1902