[Nottingham] MS uses PowerShell to break compatibility on Linux

[Neal Ponton]

I've recently added the Risky Business podcast to my queue (I have a habit of drifting off to sleep wearing a pair Bluetooth headphones). Most of it is way over my head, but the Australian presenter really knows his infosec. 
http://risky.biz/netcasts/risky-business

Just last night I was listening to the latest episode and Powershell gets a huge bashing (no pun intended) at the start for being insecure against hacks (both network traversal and privilege escalation, if I remember rightly). 
So, Risky Business podcast good and Powershell bad. 
Ta, 
Neal. 


26. Aug 2016 18:57 by nottingham at mailman.lug.org.uk:


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> On 22/08/16 09:07, Jason Irwin via Nottingham wrote:
>> Or...
>>
>> A decision was taken years ago in isolation, which now turns out to
>> have been a bit silly and needs fixing.
>>
>> Either way, some of these comments make for some comedic reading: 
>> https://github.com/PowerShell/PowerShell/pull/1901
>
> Note the agonising on there about possibly breaking PowerShell scripts
> written on Windows that may rely on the erroneous operation...
>
> Myself, (to badly misuse a term) /surely/ an easy and compatible way
> out is to have an environment variable that defaults to the erroneous
> Windows way of working and that can be set to expose instead the *nix
> way of things when set for a particular script... Easy?
>
>
> In the surprisingly long discussion, ya just gotta LOVE the enthusiastic:
>
> #####
> You bring up a great point. We added a number of aliases for Unix
> commands but if someone has installed those commands on WIndows, those
> aliases screw them up.
>
> We need to fix this.
>
> The only Q is what is the best way to do so? As Joey points out -
> having shipped these, removing them is a breaking change. ...
> #####
>
>
> #####
>
> Wow, great discussion!
>
> #####
>
>
> #####
>
> Thanks for providing input to make PowerShell great
>
> #####
>
>
> What might this all mean? Hopefully that enthusiasm is all genuine
> enthusiasm for discovering the power of FLOSS cooperation.
>
>
>
> Meanwhile, for an encore:
>
>
> *Windows Update borks PowerShell – Microsoft won't fix it for a week*
>
> 'We apologize for any inconvenience that this might cause'
>
> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/08/25/microsoft_breaks_powershell_with_borked_update_wont_fix_it_for_a_week
>
>
> ... What was that about not causing breakage?...
>
>
> One to watch further...
>
> Cheers,
> Martin
>
>
>
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