5 ms·

Android: Worst. Bug. Ever.

90 points by bockris 18y ago

jcl 18y ago
Wow... that's pretty bad. I just tried it and it works. I hope they roll out a fix soon -- it's a little scary to think that each keystroke is going to both the current application and an invisible, root-level command prompt.
- kqr2 18y ago
  But I hope that they don't cut off root access!
  - jcl 18y ago
    I'm curious: What would you do with root access that you can't already do with the phone itself?
    - wmf 18y ago
      Routing between 3G and 802.11 comes to mind, although I don't know if the kernel has the right modules.
    - vetinari 18y ago
      For example: flash your own image (without root, you can only flash image signed by T-Mobile/Google/HTC; how good is to have access to source code, if you can't build it and run it on real device?), create VPN connections, write useful bluetooth profiles like DUN (tethering done correctly) or A2DP. What you can do with root access is much longer list than what you can do the Google blessed way.
    - jodrellblank 18y ago
      The "if you've done nothing wrong, you've nothing to hide" argument in another disguise. You're the one (as much as) arguing in favour of expending effort, adding code and complexity to restrict my root access, the burden is on you to justify doing so, not on me to refute it.
- tlrobinson 18y ago
  Luckily I don't type "sudo rm -rf /" or similar things in normal conversation very often...
  - jcl 18y ago
    True, you wouldn't type a delete command in normal conversation, but you have to feel sorry for the guys in the bug report who were running ssh sessions on their phones... They were typing UNIX commands and thus were at a much higher risk of harm. You wouldn't need the "sudo" -- it's a root-level prompt. (Hmm... typing "make me a sandwich" unfortunately has no visible effects...)
  - nostrademons 18y ago
    Good thing you didn't post this comment from an Android phone... ;-)
zzzmarcus 18y ago
I just tried it as well and... it works. It's pretty scary but has some good prank-potential until they fix it :)
dmpayton 18y ago
If I were a malicious person, I'd head to my local T-Mobile store to `rm -rf /` But I'm not a malicious person, so I'll only reboot it just to check it out.
- zzzmarcus 18y ago
  Most of what you could hurt is mounted read-only so... probably wouldn't do much harm, but it's a nice thought anyway :)
rms 18y ago
I thought it was going to call 911.
- kirubakaran 18y ago
  That would be the second worst. The worst would be if it called 411 when you dialled 911.
kwamenum86 18y ago
I guess even Google can't get the whole OS thing right on the first try.
- mickt 18y ago
  This probably isn't Google's fault, it's probably the fault of someone on the T-Mobile team or at HTC who accidently left this running on the OS image put on the phones.
mihasya 18y ago
That is nowhere near the worst bug ever. But nice headline attention whoring. Did Michael Arrington guest write?
- rshao 18y ago
  Yeah definitely not. It's not like the girl's ims from the other end executed on the shell. Seems like it was an easy bug to find and temporarily patch. An official fix will probably come soon.
- davidw 18y ago
  Yeah, this is a little bit worse, for starters: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25
icey 18y ago
Type in "cat" on its own and hit enter. It'll hang the underlying shell until this gets fixed. You'll need to do this after each reboot of the phone.
Allocator2008 18y ago
The worst bug ever is the arithmetic mistake made by a programmer of a FORTRAN program which crashed a probe to Venus. Millions of dollars down the drain just like that, and just a simple programming error.
- EliAndrewC 18y ago
  That may be the most costly bug ever in terms of money, but there have also been a (small) number of human fatalities resulting from software bugs. Those are arguably much worse than the Venus probe.
  - ropiku 18y ago
    Also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25, that caused more damage then erasing a phone.
deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
fauigerzigerk 18y ago
So the worst bug ever is being logged in a as root on my own device? I can see why this may not be a good idea, particularly on a phone, but it's certainly not the worst bug ever as far as I'm concerned. This is blown out of proportion.

90 points by bockris 18y ago

jcl 18y ago

Wow... that's pretty bad. I just tried it and it works. I hope they roll out a fix soon -- it's a little scary to think that each keystroke is going to both the current application and an invisible, root-level command prompt.

kqr2 18y ago
But I hope that they don't cut off root access!
- jcl 18y ago
  I'm curious: What would you do with root access that you can't already do with the phone itself?
  - wmf 18y ago
    Routing between 3G and 802.11 comes to mind, although I don't know if the kernel has the right modules.
  - vetinari 18y ago
    For example: flash your own image (without root, you can only flash image signed by T-Mobile/Google/HTC; how good is to have access to source code, if you can't build it and run it on real device?), create VPN connections, write useful bluetooth profiles like DUN (tethering done correctly) or A2DP. What you can do with root access is much longer list than what you can do the Google blessed way.
  - jodrellblank 18y ago
    The "if you've done nothing wrong, you've nothing to hide" argument in another disguise. You're the one (as much as) arguing in favour of expending effort, adding code and complexity to restrict my root access, the burden is on you to justify doing so, not on me to refute it.
tlrobinson 18y ago
Luckily I don't type "sudo rm -rf /" or similar things in normal conversation very often...
- jcl 18y ago
  True, you wouldn't type a delete command in normal conversation, but you have to feel sorry for the guys in the bug report who were running ssh sessions on their phones... They were typing UNIX commands and thus were at a much higher risk of harm. You wouldn't need the "sudo" -- it's a root-level prompt. (Hmm... typing "make me a sandwich" unfortunately has no visible effects...)
- nostrademons 18y ago
  Good thing you didn't post this comment from an Android phone... ;-)

zzzmarcus 18y ago

I just tried it as well and... it works. It's pretty scary but has some good prank-potential until they fix it :)

dmpayton 18y ago

If I were a malicious person, I'd head to my local T-Mobile store to `rm -rf /` But I'm not a malicious person, so I'll only reboot it just to check it out.

zzzmarcus 18y ago
Most of what you could hurt is mounted read-only so... probably wouldn't do much harm, but it's a nice thought anyway :)

rms 18y ago

I thought it was going to call 911.

kirubakaran 18y ago
That would be the second worst. The worst would be if it called 411 when you dialled 911.

kwamenum86 18y ago

I guess even Google can't get the whole OS thing right on the first try.

mickt 18y ago
This probably isn't Google's fault, it's probably the fault of someone on the T-Mobile team or at HTC who accidently left this running on the OS image put on the phones.

mihasya 18y ago

That is nowhere near the worst bug ever. But nice headline attention whoring. Did Michael Arrington guest write?

rshao 18y ago
Yeah definitely not. It's not like the girl's ims from the other end executed on the shell. Seems like it was an easy bug to find and temporarily patch. An official fix will probably come soon.
davidw 18y ago
Yeah, this is a little bit worse, for starters: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25

icey 18y ago

Type in "cat" on its own and hit enter. It'll hang the underlying shell until this gets fixed. You'll need to do this after each reboot of the phone.

Allocator2008 18y ago

The worst bug ever is the arithmetic mistake made by a programmer of a FORTRAN program which crashed a probe to Venus. Millions of dollars down the drain just like that, and just a simple programming error.

EliAndrewC 18y ago
That may be the most costly bug ever in terms of money, but there have also been a (small) number of human fatalities resulting from software bugs. Those are arguably much worse than the Venus probe.
- ropiku 18y ago
  Also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25, that caused more damage then erasing a phone.

deleted 18y ago

[deleted]

fauigerzigerk 18y ago

So the worst bug ever is being logged in a as root on my own device? I can see why this may not be a good idea, particularly on a phone, but it's certainly not the worst bug ever as far as I'm concerned. This is blown out of proportion.