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Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
281–290 of 556 posts
Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#282Here's the codeproject link the code came from. https://www.codeproject.com/Articles/17052/Self-Deleting-Exe... > Whether they follow the licensing terms for that code I do not know. I'm guessing they didn't ship the binary with a link pointing back to this page? These's also another codeproject example that uses a bat file, which is fairly similar to the recommendation in the post. I guess that's the better example.…
Funnily enough, real malware does this correctly. Usually by just ShellExecing "ping -n 3 127.0.0.1 >nul" followed by "del" - no temporary file needed.
Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#283Why do Windows programs need special installers/uninstallers? Why isn't this handled by Windows itself?
How could Windows handle it by itself? If it provides a framework for installers/uninstallers, it'll be fighting the inertia of decades of legacy software, programmer habits, and old tutorials. If it tracks file ownership by program, it might accidentally delete user files. How would it differentiate between a VSCode extension that should be uninstalled, and a binary compiled with VSCode for a user project? A false p…
Oh. I thought MSI and WinGet (sorry, AppGet in fact) designed to solve these problems.
Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#284Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think any major desktop OS handles this well. I suspect the final form for software installation is probably where iOS and Android are going in the EU, where there's a single means of installing software to the device so that everything can be sandboxed properly, but the acquisition/update process can be pointed to a URL/Store that the user has pre-approved. macOS comes pretty close to what I'd ideally want i…
Everyone is pointing at Windows but there are still installer software on MacOS. Normally crusty old corpoware like Citrix that needs to extend its tentacles to the whole system. On Unix/Linux land the prevalence of pipe curl to bash type installers is not much different. I normally keep both types away from my computers.
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Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#285Earlier quoted context omitted.
That is not a user-specified authority.
I would also like this option. I see why Apple finds it undesirable though. Software installation safeguards are a game of whack-a-mole with (e.g.) support scammers who ask grandma/Lee-in-accounting/Cindy-next-door to naively click through all the warnings. The closest Apple comes to this capability is achieved via device Supervision and MDM, which might be comfortable for some of us here in this forum but obviously…
And being the only authority also happens to be conveniently aligned to their financial incentives.
Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#286Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why does the XDG spec have authority over software?
It usually doesn't, and it's mostly a good standards recommendation that even the most GPL of GPL codebases doesn't always follow (looking at you, emacs).
GNU emacs was created at 1984.
XDG Base Directory spec was started around 2003..
Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#287Earlier quoted context omitted.
The packages are cryptographically signed, you have the option to abort the install of an untrusted package before it does something malicious.
> packages are cryptographically signed packages are cryptographically signed by the packager, by the way on Debian you add the key when you install a new repository. The signature tells you "This package has been built by X and has not been tempered in the meantime", not "X and this package are not malicious, I promise". > you have the option to abort the install of an untrusted package before it does something mali…
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Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#288Earlier quoted context omitted.
I guess so... but then you're assuming that the user isn't saving data in that directory :-P but honestly, please Windows Dev's.. use MSI's please it make me love you and i have so much love to give.
Yes. But if you stick everything into a single .exe, the user can't interfere.
> Yes. But if you stick everything into a single .exe, the user can't interfere.
Alright cowboy, so where are you storing preferences and settings?
Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#289Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why would you want that? If you have separate partitions, would you really want user data to go to the system partition? Or a third partition? Do you find having more places that user programs can write a benefit?
I would favor a /var/user/something directory. The fact that nobody does that is pretty much a consequence of the difficulty of coordinating multiple projects that do not have a common authority, not because it is a bad idea.
Should that count towards user disk quota?
Re: Any sufficiently advanced uninstaller is indistinguishable from malware
#290Why do Windows programs need special installers/uninstallers? Why isn't this handled by Windows itself?
It is, these days. Windows 10 onwards has a native package format called MSIX that somewhat resembles packages on Linux. They're special zips containing an XML file that declares how the software should be integrated into the OS (start menu, commands on the PATH, file associations etc). Windows takes care of installation, update and uninstallation. The system is great, in theory. In practice adoption has been held ba…
> For example you can get Chrome-style updates where Windows will keep the app fresh in the background even if it's not running
Considering the ability to update itself is a requirement of Cyber Resilience Act in EU, I foresee a big uptick in usage (and app stores usage of course).