[comp.os.minix] bug in rm -r

kirkenda@jove.cs.pdx.edu (Steve Kirkendall) (05/08/89)

A funny thing just happened to me while running Minix-ST...

I was in a directory called $HOME/work/precomm and wanted to remove a directory
called $HOME/work/hostmgr, so I did this:

	$ rm -r ../hostmgr

AND IT TRIED TO DELETE MY CURRENT DIRECTORY!  It got as far as deleting .
and .. before it got stuck & quit, so I didn't loose any data files.  But I
was left with a directory that had no . or .. entries in it, a definite no-no.

OK, so I copied my files to a different directory, did a chdir out of the
mangled precomm directory, and tried to delete the poor thing.  I couldn't.
Eventually I figured out that root could, however, so my file system is healthy
again.

But I will NEVER try to `rm -r ../anything` again.  Not under Minix-ST anyway.
(No, I have not tried to reproduce this bug, either, so I may have miss-guessed
the prime mover of this bug.)

	-- Steve Kirkendall
	   ...uunet!tektronix!psu-cs!kirkenda

jf@laura.UUCP (Jan-Hinrich Fessel) (05/08/89)

In article <1152@psueea.UUCP> kirkenda@jove.cs.pdx.edu (Steve Kirkendall) writes:
>A funny thing just happened to me while running Minix-ST...
>
>	$ rm -r ../hostmgr
>
>AND IT TRIED TO DELETE MY CURRENT DIRECTORY!  It got as far as deleting .
>and .. before it got stuck & quit, so I didn't loose any data files.  But I
>was left with a directory that had no . or .. entries in it, a definite no-no.

The same with rm ../junk/anyfile, and best of all mv ../anyfile . :
unable to read contents of .

>OK, so I copied my files to a different directory, did a chdir out of the

I wonder how you copyed the file to another directory, i was unable to 
retrieve them...

	Jan-Hinrich
-- 
			      Jan-Hinrich Fessel
	Universitaet Dortmund, IRB	jf@unido.uucp  ||  jf@unido.bitnet
	There's no way to delay that trouble comin' every day... F.Z.
 ============================================================================= 

henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) (05/10/89)

In article <1152@psueea.UUCP> kirkenda@jove.cs.pdx.edu (Steve Kirkendall) writes:
>	$ rm -r ../hostmgr
>
>AND IT TRIED TO DELETE MY CURRENT DIRECTORY!  ...
>(No, I have not tried to reproduce this bug, either, so I may have miss-guessed
>the prime mover of this bug.)

One obvious potential trouble spot is accidentally typing a space between
the ".." and the rest...
-- 
Mars in 1980s:  USSR, 2 tries, |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
2 failures; USA, 0 tries.      | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu

donw@rwing.UUCP (Don Wennick) (05/11/89)

In article <1152@psueea.UUCP>, kirkenda@jove.cs.pdx.edu (Steve Kirkendall)
writes:

> A funny thing just happened to me while running Minix-ST...

Mine was in Minix-PC 1.4

> 	$ rm -r ../hostmgr

I did something like:

	$ rmdir ../dir

and it wiped my current directory's . and .., which I recovered from in
a similar way. Never did look into it, though.

jf@laura.UUCP (Jan-Hinrich Fessel) (05/11/89)

In article <1989May9.174405.727@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>>	$ rm -r ../hostmgr
>
>One obvious potential trouble spot is accidentally typing a space between
>the ".." and the rest...
You hear manical laughter nearby...

even with no blanks between .. and the rest tghis works the way nobody wants
it to work...

	Jan-Hinrich
-- 
			      Jan-Hinrich Fessel
	Universitaet Dortmund, IRB	jf@unido.uucp  ||  jf@unido.bitnet
	There's no way to delay that trouble comin' every day... F.Z.
 =============================================================================