Re: vim vs nano on editing system files

On Thursday, August 8, 2013 11:42:31 AM UTC-5, Rob Owens wrote:
> ----- Original Message -----
>
> > From: "Rob Owens" <rowens@ptd.net>
>
> >
>
> > ----- Original Message -----
>
> > > From: "Dahong Tang" <tang.dahong@gmail.com>
>
> >
>
> > > Here are the commands that I tested:
>
> > >
>
> > > $ sudo touch testvim
>
> > > $ ls -al
>
> > > -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 0 Aug 8 08:25 testvim
>
> > > $ vi testvim
>
> > > :w!
>
> > > :q
>
> > > $ ls -al
>
> > > -rw-r--r-- 1 user user 0 Aug 8 08:26 testvim
>
> > >
>
> > > I don't understand why vim would override both file permission and
>
> > > ownership. Any ideas?
>
> > >
>
> >
>
> > I can't reproduce this. When I enter :w! I get the following
>
> > message:
>
> >
>
> > "testvim" E212: Can't open file for writing
>
> > Press ENTER or type command to continue
>
> >
>
> > This is on a Debian Wheezy system with the packaged version of vim.
>
> >
>
> I tried the above in the /tmp directory. When I try it in my own home directory, it indeed works like Dahong says.
>
>
>
> -Rob

It's strange isn't it? You think nobody could mess with 644 files that belong to you, but if another user has write permission to the same directory, then he can overwrite your files using vim and totally mess them up. I don't understand why this was chosen as the default behavior of vim. Seems dangerous.

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