"Paul M. Foster" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > In my case, it isn't a problem, since it is a single user machine on a > network, with my wife running Win95 on the other machine. But I see the > point. So presumably, if someone could write something to /dev/vcsa*, it > would show up on my screen. Hm. Up until I unpacked this editor, I hadn't > even heard of /dev/vcsa*.
/dev/vcsa* and /dev/vcs* devices are nice, even if using them does make it a bit more difficult to port FTE to screens that aren't virtual consoles (like xterms). It's much better that a program use these devices than try to open /dev/kmem (Yes, someone wrote an editor ostensibly for linux that did that. An evil, evil program.) It would be nice if login could set perms and ownership on vcs* devices the way it does on ttys - that would be the ideal solution. Try this: As root (or any other user who can access /dev/vcs0), do: cat /dev/vcs0 > /tmp/storevcs then do something which does stuff to the screen - ls or the like. Then: cat /tmp/storevcs > /dev/vcs0 (vcs0 means whatever vc is currently displayed). And instantly your screen image will go back to what it was at the first cat. This is an example of what people could do to your screen.
