Microsoft: Vista won't get a backdoor 3272

In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Lin¿nut wrote on Wed, 08 Mar 2006 07:23:02 -0600

"The" tar file? I've got news for you...the build descriptors can include tar files, patches, and a fair number of USE flags, which can modify what goes in there and-or the makeflags.

xterm * in particular can take Xaw3d, doc, toolbar, truetype, and unicode flags; presumably these modify -D flags somewhere in the build process and I have no idea as to the details of that process, without a bit of study. (For some reason this version of xterm is truncating your name to 'Lin', despite my building slrn and xterm with unicode support. It's annoying, but Pan has its own problems.)

This is not to say one can't study the new code -- but that's an incomplete answer no matter how one slices it. But it's a start, no doubt about it, and a vast improvement over the invisible code of Microsoft Windows.

The emerge system will print out the files used as the first step in the build, too. It ain't perfect, but what is? :-)

* xterm isn't that good an example, admittedly; it's part of the original X distribution and probably has been mucked up six ways from Sunday. However, it's the one coming readily to mind.

-- It's still legal to go .sigless.