OSEC

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Subject: complexity estimate
From: Antonomasia (antnotatla.demon.co.uk)
Date: Sat May 13 2000 - 16:24:38 CDT

I've been asked to write a program to the following description:
    to be run by non-root admin users
    it adds user accounts to the box
    the username is selected by the person running the program
    the new UIDs are in a given range
    the above two values are checked for uniqueness before processing
    the new GID is fixed
    the home directory is made according to a set pattern

    there will be a separate program for setting the passwords
    it is only for one version of Unix
    no NIS is involved
    it should not delete accounts

Gaps in the spec are to be filled from the imagination of the programmer;
in fact the 3 last non-features mentioned above only became explicit
when I asked.

I'd like to collect a few answers from the experts off list and
I'll summarise probably next week.

1) On a scale of
      trivial, easy, straightforward, challenging,
      mindbending or forget it
   how do you rate this task?

2) Would you consider a (bourne or korn) shell script in a suid C wrapper ?

3) How many lines of C would you expect to use ?

4) How long for 1 programmer to do the whole lot fit to deliver ?

Needless to say I have views on Q1 and Q2 and should soon have definite
answers for the others. I also have my (skilled, technical) supervisor's
view of Q1 and Q2 and it would be interesting to see where we fit with
list members on these estimates. 

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# Antonomasia   antnotatla.demon.co.uk                      #
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