1 Nov 2011 19:12
Unix Admin horror stories
Henry M <henry95 <at> gmail.com>
2011-11-01 18:12:43 GMT
2011-11-01 18:12:43 GMT
The entries are pretty old, but it's still an entertaining read.
http://www-uxsup.csx.cam.ac.uk/misc/horror.txt
Snippet:
I was working on a line printer spooler, which lived in /etc. I wanted to remove it, and so issued the command "rm /etc/lpspl." There was only one problem. Out of habit, I typed "passwd" after "/etc/" and removed the password file. Oops. I called up the person who handled backups, and he restored the password file. A couple of days later, I did it again! This time, after he restored it, he made a link, /etc/safe_from_tim. About a week later, I overwrote /etc/passwd, rather than removing it. After he restored it again, he installed a daemon that kept a copy of /etc/passwd, on another file system, and automatically restored it if it appeared to have been damaged. Fortunately, I finished my work on /etc/lpspl around this time, so we didn't have to see if I could find a way to wipe out a couple of filesystems... --Tim Smith
Regards,
Henry
<div> <p>The entries are pretty old, but it's still an entertaining read.<br><a href="http://www-uxsup.csx.cam.ac.uk/misc/horror.txt">http://www-uxsup.csx.cam.ac.uk/misc/horror.txt</a><br><br>Snippet:<br></p>From: <a href="mailto:tzs <at> stein.u.washington.edu">tzs <at> stein.u.washington.edu</a> (Tim Smith) Organization: University of Washington, Seattle<br>I was working on a line printer spooler, which lived in /etc. I wanted to remove it, and so issued the command "rm /etc/lpspl." There was only one problem. Out of habit, I typed "passwd" after "/etc/" and removed the password file. Oops. I called up the person who handled backups, and he restored the password file. A couple of days later, I did it again! This time, after he restored it, he made a link, /etc/safe_from_tim. About a week later, I overwrote /etc/passwd, rather than removing it. After he restored it again, he installed a daemon that kept a copy of /etc/passwd, on another file system, and automatically restored it if it appeared to have been damaged. Fortunately, I finished my work on /etc/lpspl around this time, so we didn't have to see if I could find a way to wipe out a couple of filesystems... --Tim Smith<br><br><br>Regards,<br>Henry <br><br> </div>
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