Re: Shorten down the Dutch translation of the root password question dialog in package shadow

[Jouke Witteveen <j.witteveen@mail.ru>]

cobaco (aka Bart Cornelis) wrote:

On Friday 25 March 2005 10:04, Jouke Witteveen wrote:
  

cobaco (aka Bart Cornelis) wrote:
    

On Wednesday 23 March 2005 14:02, Christian Perrier wrote:
      

ok, so how 'long' can the long description be?
          

Tricky..:-)

But you can use the podebconf-display-po utility for this (from the
po-debconf package). Of course you have to use it in a 80x25 terminal.
        

ok, updated version attached, I pruned it so it fits on 1 screen in a
80x25 terminal (which is better, though that screen does scroll, we
really need a better scroll indicator in the dialog frontend :-( )
      

It's still quite big. 
    

It fits on one screen which is what counts

  

Is it realy necessary to give such an extended 
description of a good password?
    

necessary, no, useful yes (IMO) 

(and really the given discription is pretty much a minimal description of a 
good password, and how to choose one)

  

I mean, if you do need a good password (ie you're a professional
sysadmin) you already know this. If you don't (you're setting-up Debian
on a personal pc) you probably won't need one and 
    

if you're gonna use passwords at all, you should make sure they're good 
passwords, otherwise you might as well not bother. (and in any case it 
being a personal machine won't stop it from being a target these days, 
almost everyone now has an always one broadband connection)

  

My home pc is protected with a wordbook password for the personal user account. The advantage is that it is easy to type (omitting Caps, interpunction and numbers lessens the movement of the fingers) and still keeps everyone I know from having write access to my files.

As to an admin already knowing this. there's lots of people acting as the 
admin of networks (in for instance schools, non-profits, small 
companies, ...) that don't have an ICT-background (they simply happen to be 
the person with the most ICT-knowhow available), and my experience tells me 
odds are they won't know

(the company I work for does networks for schools, on each school there's 1 
or 2 teachers doing the daily admin stuff (such as changing the backup 
tapes), for about a year I tought the 2-day ICT course they get as part of 
the package, and they _needed_ to be told)

  

IMO such people shouldn't install a Debian server.

just saying: "Dit is 
belangrijk, zorg dat je een goed wachtwoord neemt" will make the
situation clear too...
    

if you're gonna tell them they need a good password, you should also tell 
them what that means, it's kinda pointless to start explaining something 
and then stop halfway.

  

Yes, when, as you say, people don't know what a good password is you must explain.

('what's a good password', and 'how do you choose one you can still remember 
are the 2 questions I got asked _every_ single time, when I tought that 
course)
  

One of the first programs I ever wrote (QBASIC) generates good passwords. You can skip the explanation and just give an _example_ (generated by such a program) of a good password (no more than an example; they must still think of a password themselves). You can also propose to run a C variant of this program to generate a password.
To remember a good password you should type it a thousand times and just learn it by heart.
(Old, unmodified source included below for it's sentimental value)

But that's just a suggestion. I do not think it's a necessity to change it. It is good as it is, though it can be better.

One other question;
Why speak english on a dutch list?

---

REM 0-9=48-57; A-Z=65-90; a-z=97-122
PRINT
sta:
PRINT : PRINT "interrelations:": PRINT
PRINT "uppercase:": PRINT "lowercase:": PRINT "numbers:"
LOCATE CSRLIN - 3, 12: INPUT "", uc%
LOCATE CSRLIN, 12: INPUT "", lc%
LOCATE CSRLIN, 12: INPUT "", nr%
PRINT "---": INPUT "length:    ", lh%
PRINT : PRINT
aga:
LOCATE CSRLIN - 2: PRINT : PRINT "password: ";
FOR ct% = 1 TO lh%
RANDOMIZE TIMER
rm% = INT((uc% + lc% + nr%) * RND + 1)
RANDOMIZE TIMER
IF rm% <= uc% THEN PRINT CHR$(INT(26 * RND + 65));
IF rm% <= (uc% + lc%) AND rm% > uc% THEN PRINT CHR$(INT(26 * RND + 97));
IF rm% > (uc% + lc%) THEN PRINT CHR$(INT(10 * RND + 48));
NEXT ct%
PRINT : PRINT "again? ";
DO: ky$ = INKEY$: LOOP UNTIL ky$ <> "": PRINT ky$: IF ASC(ky$) = 13
THEN LOCATE CSRLIN - 1
IF ky$ = "y" OR ky$ = "Y" OR ky$ = " " OR ASC(ky$) = 13 GOTO aga
PRINT "new password? ";
DO: ky$ = INKEY$: LOOP UNTIL ky$ <> "": PRINT ky$: IF ASC(ky$) = 13
THEN LOCATE CSRLIN - 1
IF ky$ = "y" OR ky$ = "Y" OR ky$ = " " OR ASC(ky$) = 13 GOTO sta
PRINT "press any key to exit...": DO: LOOP UNTIL INKEY$ <> ""
END