Re: [9fans] getenv/putenv

[Lucio De Re <lucio@proxima.alt.za>]

On Mon, Mar 19, 2001 at 09:40:37AM -0500, presotto@plan9.bell-labs.com wrote:
> 
> I think you're right.  We not as env crazy as Unix is so the risk is
> lower but not nonexistant of somehow fooling a program to write
> something, so why have it at all.  Anyone else want to comment?
> If not, I'll just check for '/' in getenv/putenv names and punt
> if I find one.

Maybe unrelated to the above, and maybe not altogether, although
I can't quite make the connection (been up too long :-)

Been thinking that there ought to be an API/9P function to "drop"
irrecoverably parts of the user namespace.  Make them go away in
a particular context.  You can always mount a lower branch and make
the rest go, if you want to.  Maybe even keep the mount point but
make its contents invisible, or whatever (this last could be done
as things stand now, in a practical sense, bit it is reversible,
which I think should not be the case).

Of course, such a feature may already exist and I'm just displaying
my ignorance, but I have thought about it and nothing I've looked
at seemed to do the trick.  If on the other hand you Bell Labs
folks have looked at it already and discarded it as possibility,
I would be curious to know why.  From my point of view it is an
interesting way to provide a degree of security and protection,
specially against trojan horses.

++L