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Utilities (Apple) Businesses Software Apple

Virex 7.2 Hazardous to Fink's Health 36

Posted by pudge from the danger-will-robinson dept.
Gorgonzola writes "It was reported that Virex 7.2 and Fink were conflicting, it turned out that Virex 7.2 was overwriting libraries in Fink's default directory, thus hosing Fink for those who had it installed, and preventing Fink from installing for future users. Also, one user pointed out that of Virux's included packages, several (CURL, OpenSSL, and DLCompat) had license terms that Virex was ignoring." It is strongly recommended you don't install Virex 7.2 until this issue is resolved.
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Virex 7.2 Hazardous to Fink's Health More

Virex 7.2 Hazardous to Fink's Health

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  • Virex? (Score:3, Funny)

    by program21 ( 469995 ) on Monday February 10, 2003 @09:16AM (#5270152) Homepage Journal
    Sounds enough like 'virus' that I'd be wary of installing it in the first place.

  • VirEx (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Um, it's spelled Virex, not Virux.

  • Classic Slashdot... (Score:4, Funny)

    by duffbeer703 ( 177751 ) on Monday February 10, 2003 @09:22AM (#5270183)
    Post a complaint that sounds real bad, that a small percentage of the readers of the article will understand...

    Maybe the author should be even more vague...

    "If you install a software product when another software product is also installed, libraries will be overwritten. Other software will be affected."

    Then the slashdot editor can append:

    You probaly shouldn't install a software product.
    • If you don't understand what Fink is, when there's a link to the Fink web site in the article and you've presumably read the description on the front page, maybe you should get rid of the Mac and find something a little more in line with your mental capacity. Like, an Etch-A-Sketch.

    • Re:Classic Slashdot... (Score:4, Funny)

      by Hubert_Shrump ( 256081 ) <[cobranet] [at] [gmail.com]> on Monday February 10, 2003 @11:35AM (#5271143) Journal
      You probaly shouldn't install a software product.

      You forgot:

      Those without software product (insanely long version number) are laughing pretty hard about (previously mentioned obscure technical issue), but I'm sure it's just a matter of time (link to NYT) before (other product) takes over the (misspelled, over-used catchphrase)! Update: There's a fix (link to server on fire) out, involving some knowledge of (obscure acronym one other person knows - they punch wildly into the air and scream). It's a 40(new method of measuring disk space necessary here) download - better fire up the T1!

  • Hrm. Another example of commercialism gone bad, and not just to the detriment of users. we don't even get a choice!. Once ths one virus package is installed, fink cannot be used.

    This sounds less like the makers of virex are supporting open source by using the software in their systems, than it is they're working against it by ensuring that nothing else can use it.

    Which would be more popular for OS X users? I think most people will end up with virex on their systems by the sound of it, and make fink look silly when it fails

    no fink, no open source on OS X.

    Have virex done this on purpose?
    • Yeah, lemme tell you how much a company that isn't Microsoft would WANT to break software on the computer it is being installed on. It wouldn't, plain and simple. Users have a funny way of bitching REALLY hard when new software breaks their currently installed software. Therefore companies don't want to break shit. Stop with the bullshit 'Apple is evil' trolling in disguise.
      • Where did I say apple is evil? The parties concerned are virex which has nothing to do with apple, and fink which is an open source project. neither are apple.

        You are making presumptions, and if you didn't know, a presumption is a little story you tell yourself to attemp in holding up your own biases. That's lying, but lying to yourself worst of all.

        Pity
    • The only reason I ever ran Virex was to be a 'nice guy' to friends who use Windows and make sure that in forwarding some MS Office document from one Windows user to another I don't forward a virus as well. Virex has probably caught about 50 Windows viri over the years but never once anything that would actually execute on my Mac.

      Fink is 'the' package management system on the Mac and the only one I use. I think my reaction is very typical: "Goodbye Virex."

      I really doubt this is some anti OSS plot. Sounds to me like the PHB asked the programmer if the new version of Virex was ready, the programmer said something like "Yes, as soon as I move some libraries into the bundle and put some acknowledgements in the 'Read Me' file."

      The PHB said "We'll do that stuff for the next release."
    • "no fink, no open source on OS X."

      Um, most of the Open Source software that I've installed has been done without fink, thank you very much, and many individuals who work quite a bit with open source have a strong distaste for it.

  • Viruses on OSX (Score:4, Informative)

    by ubiquitin ( 28396 ) on Monday February 10, 2003 @09:30AM (#5270233) Homepage Journal
    The files that get overwritten by Virex are:

    //sw
    /sw/lib
    /sw/lib/libcrypto.0.9.6.dylib
    /sw/lib/libcurl.2.0.2.dylib
    /sw/lib/libcurl.2.dylib
    /sw/lib/libdl.0.dylib
    /sw/lib/libssl.0.9.6.dylib



    Fink developers have already posted the correct way to embedding a dylib into a bundle on OS X on the McAfee forums [mcafeehelp.com]
    The viruses that McAfee attempts to prevent are really from Windows-land anyway. I have yet to run across a true native MacOSX virus. And finally, McAfee wasn't giving any credit to the Fink project. They should know better. No suprise then that Virex got bought out by a company called Network Ass.

    • Re:Viruses on OSX (Score:5, Interesting)

      by dr00g911 ( 531736 ) on Monday February 10, 2003 @10:14AM (#5270534)
      Someone asked me the other day what was the best virus protection tool for MacOS X as they were planning an upgrade.

      I scratched my head for a minute, did some checking on Symantic & McAfee's sites and realized that the Mac platform (OS X & 9 both included) hasn't seen a virus since 1997 -- the last of those autostart beasties (which still occasionally pop up on service bureau Zips).

      The relative lack of critters, and just basic common sense keep virii off my Macs.

      My Wintel boxes, however, have to live with the 20% system overhead bloat that is Norton Antivirus, coupled with Spybot S&D running at launch.
      • There is a free and slim alternative called Grisoft AVG. It's small, fast, and I recently installed it on a 486 so it's not too demanding.

        http://www.grisoft.com/
    • I somewhat lucked out in that /sw was a link for me (linking to an external drive formatted in UFS) and it didn't respect it and overwrote the link instead of following it and screwing my entire fink install.

    • Re:Viruses on OSX??? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by commodoresloat ( 172735 ) on Monday February 10, 2003 @04:47PM (#5274093)
      I asked this on macslash too and nobody gave an answer - can anybody name a single OS X virus or worm that a tool like Virex actually prevents? Why do I want to waste my time scanning for Windows viruses that won't hurt my machine and won't be transmitted to other machines unless I am enough of a moron to forward random .vbs files from emails asking for advice or offering to play a very excite game? Word macro viruses exist but it's easier to turn off macros in word than to scan every document. Why would anyone want to install Virex at all? Is it just for the psychological comfort of seeing a program tell you your system is safe?

      • Re:Viruses on OSX??? (Score:4, Funny)

        by SandSpider ( 60727 ) on Monday February 10, 2003 @06:38PM (#5275275) Homepage Journal
        I asked this on macslash too and nobody gave an answer - can anybody name a single OS X virus or worm that [...] Virex actually prevents?


        Well, sure. Norton Antivirus is the worst. It doesn't transmit itself electronically, to be sure, but it does replicate through marketing and fear. And if you install it on your system, you're guaranteed to have serious problems after.
        If you install Virex, you probably won't also install NAV. Therefore, Virex, in most instances, prevents you from getting NAV. What a lifesaver!


        =Brian

      • Well, there are some macroviruses that work on the Mac, but they require you to have MS Office...

        Other than that, there are none that I am aware of.

  • Checking the wrong box? (Score:4, Funny)

    by zachlipton ( 448206 ) on Monday February 10, 2003 @10:15AM (#5270541)
    Um, what does this have to do with AOL?
  • I know some will disagree with me on this but I just don't see the need for virus programs on the mac. I have used several different macs for the last 7 years (9 and X). I have never gotten any kind of virus, trojan, malicious attack, etc. OS X is just about the most secure operating system out there and if you have use the built-in firewall and don't open attachments from people you don't know, that's really all it takes. Besides, there is only like 1 virus that exists for OS X right now anyway.

  • Why /sw? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by iso ( 87585 ) <slash.warpzero@info> on Monday February 10, 2003 @07:47PM (#5275715) Homepage
    Why does Fink install itself in /sw? This is not the place for 3rd-party add-ons. It's completely non-standard and confusing.

    Fink should install itself into /usr/local/fink. Why doesn't it? And please do not point me towards the Fink FAQ--this only refers to installing in /usr/local (fine, a bad idea), but neverthelss, /sw should not be the alternative. /usr/local/fink with directories like /usr/local/fink/bin and /usr/local/fink/lib would be a considerably more Unix-consistent place to put these files.

    The directory /sw is a particularly bad name too, as nowhere in the name does it associate itself with fink--i.e., the software that put the directory there. plus, if I have /usr on a separate partition for all user-installed software, I want the fink stuff to go there too!

    - j
    • if you are really that mad, you can move /sw to somewhere else and symlink /sw to the moved /sw, and then make the symlink /sw invisible at the root. i know this is a pain, but the fink developers are convinced that even though apple has standards, they are above them.
    • There is nothing preventing you from chosing another directory. My fink installation is in /usr/sw. You can put it wherever you want. It was an installation choice and you could probably change it. There is the Basepath variable in /sw/etc/fink.conf but you will probably have to recompile everything to make it work in the new location.
    • Sure, if Fink was a single app it should be in /usr/local. But it's not. Fink is a package manager that put all software it manages in one place, isolated from the standard OS X directories. That means that Fink users don't have to worry about trashing OS X with non-standard libraries and don't have to worry about software update trashing their copy of the Gimp by installing an incompatible piece of code.

      It also means that you can safely uninstall every fink package you ever compiled by typing "rm -rf /sw".

      What's so bad about this?
    • I entirly agree with you. As the conduit of Unix apps to OS X, fink has a responsibility to follow Unix tradition.

      I realize that OS X is not exactly Unix, but I see no reason for /sw to be the default. As a Unix user, this confused the hell out of me when I installed fink, and, to my shame, I was forced to RTFM.

    • Fink should install itself into /usr/local/fink. Why doesn't it? And please do not point me towards the Fink FAQ--this only refers to installing in /usr/local (fine, a bad idea), but neverthelss, /sw should not be the alternative. /usr/local/fink with directories like /usr/local/fink/bin and /usr/local/fink/lib would be a considerably more Unix-consistent place to put these files.
      Completely wrong!

      /usr/local/ isn't meant to have this directory structure. Packages in /usr/local/ should install their binaries to /usr/local/bin/, their libs to /usr/local/lib/ (there they could have a subdirectory, just like in /usr/lib/), their man pages to /usr/local/man/manX/ etc.

      Packages that want to manage their own directory structure should use /opt/Name/.

  • Not so very interesting detail:

    As the main author of libcurl, I've apparently been mentioned in the About box of Virex and now people have started emailing me feature-requests for Virex...

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