Re: [dev] [sbase][RFC] patch: whitespace patches

From: Dimitris Papastamos <sin_AT_2f30.org>
Date: Thu, 25 Feb 2016 13:45:58 +0000

On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 02:42:42PM +0100, Mattias Andrée wrote:
> On Thu, 25 Feb 2016 14:11:05 +0100
> FRIGN <dev_AT_frign.de> wrote:
>
> > On Thu, 25 Feb 2016 13:39:30 +0100
> > Mattias Andrée <maandree_AT_kth.se> wrote:
> >
> > Hey Matthias,
> >
> > > I think the documentation should be clear that it
> > > only to be relied upon if whitespace changes do
> > > not have any affects. Perhaps it should not allow
> > > introducing whitespace where there was none,
> > >
> > > -helloworld
> > > +hello world
> > >
> > > or removing all whitespace
> > >
> > > -hello world !
> > > +helloworld !
> > >
> > > to protect against changes in strings. This however
> > > does would mean that
> > >
> > > -a=b*c
> > > +a = b * c
> > >
> > > would not be allowed either.
> >
> > this is insane. Just read the fucking patches and stop
> > handholding the users.
> >
> > Cheers
> >
> > FRIGN
> >
>
> Whitespace patches can be large. This is to help ensure
> that the user does not miss something in the patch that
> changes the behaviour of the program. Like someone trying
> to sneak in a backdoor or otherwise weaken security.
> Of course the user will be reading the patch to make
> sure that the patch fixes the whitespace correctly.
>
> So it is not about handholding, but rather a security
> feature.

Currently, the easy way to do that is to build with and without
the patch and run sha1 on the resulting binaries.
Received on Thu Feb 25 2016 - 14:45:58 CET