[Gllug] Problem with users (authing over Active Directory) not being about to run software, but local users can.

[Peter Childs]

2009/10/15 Matthew King <matthew.king at monnsta.net>:
> John Edwards <john at cornerstonelinux.co.uk> writes:
>
>> In the old days it used to be a 16 bit unsigned int, so 65535
>> (2^16 -1). Almost all modern UNIX-like systems now use a 32 bit
>> signed int, so 2147483647 (2^31 -1).
>
> Is there any reason why when this was implemented it was decided to use
> 31 instead of 32 bits? I know that 4 billion users is unlikely but it
> seems a bit odd to use an unsigned instead of a signed int.
>
> Assuming of course that negative UIDs are illegal.
>
> Matthew
>

 I suspect the reason was to keep it simple a signed integer was used
for every thing so you unsigned operators are not needed, one less
thing to break, one less thing to fix.

The logic being that when you only have 16 bits every bit matters but
when you have 32 bits available what the harm in only using only 31
and not needing two version of every operator...

Peter
-- 
Gllug mailing list  -  Gllug at gllug.org.uk
http://lists.gllug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/gllug