Security issue with .desktop files revisited

[Thiago Macieira]

Dave Cridland wrote:
>You're certainly right in thinking this is a good solution, but it's
>not one open to us, because not everywhere has extended attributes
>just yet. The only common factor we have to play with on the vast
>majority of filesystems is the file mode bits. Basically, the x bit
>is currently unused, in effect, by .desktop files, so realistically
>this is a poor man's emulation of this.

We could abuse the sticky bit for that. What's also interesting, it would 
show a "t" or "T" in the output of ls -l.

It has no effect on text files on Linux, nor on executables. However, the 
man page for "chmod" says that, on some systems, only the superuser can 
set the sticky bit. Does anyone know what such systems might be?

We'd also have to instruct download programs not to preserve the sticky 
bit when downloading files from the Internet.

However, I think using the executable bit is better and making trusted 
files executable. We'd treat .desktop files just like any other script. 
This would require that all distributions start shipping +x .desktop 
files ASAP.
-- 
Thiago Macieira  -  thiago (AT) macieira.info - thiago (AT) kde.org
  thiago.macieira (AT) trolltech.com     Trolltech AS
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