Linus Torvalds, the “Father of Linux”, has once again expressed his frustration by publishing a lengthy post on the Linux Kernel Mailing List (LKML), harshly criticizing the case-insensitive feature in file systems.
Link to the full post: https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/CAHk-=wjajMJyoTv2KZdpVRoPn0LFZ94Loci37WLVXmMxDbLOjg@mail.gmail.com/
He explicitly stated that this design is a “huge mistake”, and that file system developers have never learned from past experiences. The core issue is not insufficient testing, but rather that such functionality should never have been implemented in the first place.
Linus further warned that the case-insensitive feature poses serious security risks.
Quoting from a blog post, he illustrated that many user-space programs check whether file names conform to security-sensitive patterns, but the file system may ignore non-printable characters, leading to incorrect matches of file names that should not match. This approach of “ignoring other factors” renders security checks ineffective.
He also mentioned that Unicode characters (such as “❤” and “❤️”) are treated as identical due to the neglect of specific code points, which could result in security-sensitive files being misidentified. Linus angrily stated that this design leaves user programs vulnerable, yet developers still regard it as a “feature”.
Netizens commented:
We are different; how do we display the red heart?
Source: IT Home
Link: https://www.ithome.com/0/849/067.html
