[Info-vax] Reconfiguring VMS 6.2 - Shadow set question

[Paul Sture]

In article <k63aok$kcr$1 at dont-email.me>,
 Stephen Hoffman <seaohveh at hoffmanlabs.invalid> wrote:

> 
> Now if this were an existing server in an existing production 
> environment, then I wouldn't be suggesting that option directly, though 
> I would be working toward it.  But a new-to-the-owner box?  I'd wipe 
> and install the box.

My attitude is that I would rather not have someone else's potentially 
sensitive data on a machine that I have acquired.  Put another way, if 
someone has beeb kind enough to donate me an old piece of kit I feel it 
is my responsibility to eradicate anything which shouldn't be there.

In an inherited setup, there could also be maintenance jobs which do 
something you don't want to happen.  For example back in the days when 
disk space was tight I had nightly jobs which did an aggressive PURGE 
and deleted stuff like compiler listings.

And of course on used systems there's also the question of malware and 
back doors, or more likely on VMS, lurking bugs in startup procedures, 
or startup procedures which are so heavily tailored you need someone 
else's documentation to understand them.
 
> I don't understand why VMS folks are so allergic to the nuke-and-pave.  
> Like the folks striving for "uptime", system management isn't a 
> contest.  Nuke-and-pave gets a clean environment, with known settings, 
> with pristine files, and with fewer lurking weirdnesses, and an 
> environment that more directly matches the OpenVMS documentation.  It's 
> more maintainable.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it applies to a certain extent, but yes, I 
know I have all sorts of cruft on my main Alpha installation.  The main 
disincentive here is the thought of applying all the patches again.

-- 
Paul Sture