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I don't quite get why resource forks would be less secure. The problem of classic macOS was that there was no authorization/protection mechanism at all. Adding
by tgv 2y ago
I don't quite get why resource forks would be less secure. The problem of classic macOS was that there was no authorization/protection mechanism at all. Adding an MDEF to an application is just as dangerous as altering a binary under Linux. It is true that the nature of resource forks makes it a bit easier to write a generic hack, but if Linux would allow everyone and every process to edit all files, malware could latch onto some C or X11 library.
- JKCalhoun 2y agoI wondered a bit about that comment too. It's something of a tangent, but that the OS would load custom WDEFs (window definitions), CDEFs (control definitions), etc., and these had executable code in them, well that was how Mac got viruses. And there was a kind of hierarchy as I recall — where you could install a custom WDEF/CDEF/MDEF at the System level and it would be loaded/executed for all apps. With that line of reasoning though, as you're saying, it was not the resources themselves that were a problem but the way the OS naively loaded and ran them. Sandboxes were for kids. We definitely lived in a trusting time ... where the person computer really was for the one individual.
- ta46745747 2y agoExcept for the 100+ InsideMac tomes costing an arm and a leg; wasnt a cheap barrier accessing the only decent source of truth then on how the various *Managers worked. Still despise Apple to this day for that. Loved Metrowerks CodeWarrior though.