Systems vs. Users

[Brian Densmore]

Hmmm... interesting theory.

> The other confusion is that programming skill, knowledge, and 
> experience somehow magically confers the capability to understand and 
> work on a system level.  While it can happen, in the case of someone 
> who actually works with the system, the two skills usually have nearly

> nothing to do with each other.  Any system tech who has had to try to 
> convince a developer that his installer can't write to the boot track 
> knows this.
> 
I would agree that it is not magically true. But when I was in college,
in order to get my degree in computer programming it was a requirement 
to understand the hardware underlying the core system. In fact is was
required coursework and lab. Maybe the degree requirements are different

for different schools. Or maybe they have changed over the years. Of
course, I am a poor example to judge from, having been building PCs,
SOTA medical equipment, IBM mainframes, and programming for 20+ years.

peace,
Brian

P.S. And yes I can write a program to write to the boot sector, even
under 
Windoze 2K. Although that is much trickier than in the good old days of
DOS.
Not that it is a good idea.

P.P.S. that is exactly what the stoned virus does.

P.P.P.S. That is also what the Windows <pick your version> virus ... 
errr... software does.