oss-security - Re: systemd fails to parse user that should run service

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Message-ID: <4674075.e61U45ziGm@merkaba>
Date: Fri, 07 Jul 2017 00:34:01 +0200
From: Martin Steigerwald <martin@...htvoll.de>
To: oss-security@...ts.openwall.com
Subject: Re: systemd fails to parse user that should run service

Simon McVittie - 06.07.17, 22:12:
> In general the same is true for the *values* of directives: systemd needs
> to choose something to do about known directives with values that it
> cannot understand, and in general they are ignored with a warning on
> the assumption that the new value is something that might have been
> understood by a newer version of systemd. That isn't appropriate for
> all directives, hence <https://github.com/systemd/systemd/pull/6300>.

Finally. Thanks.

Now: Instead of closing the original issue as *not a bug*, it would have been 
an approbiate reaction to fix the issue and then close the bug. This is what 
upsets me most: Upstream developer behavior regarding the original github 
issue was inapprobiate.

Taking the issue seriously from the beginning would additionally have avoided 
all of the discussion here and elsewhere. What triggered the discussion was 
that upstream developers basically explained "this is not a bug, go away" and 
this… in my perception in an arrogant "we know better than you tone".

My hope is that some day the upstream developers of Systemd who handled the 
original github issue the way they did, wake up… and reconsider whether their 
behavior is approbiate and if not… change it. Cause from what I saw in the 
last years, there is a pattern to handle bugs by quickly closing them as not a 
bug. A pattern that even Linus himself criticized… rightfully so… in clear 
words.

There is a social, a behavorial issue here… which IMHO is even more important 
than the technical one.

Thank you.
-- 
Martin

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