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Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

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Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure I'd call it an alignment issue, because, in all cases I've seen where it does this (usually what I've seen is writing a python script to get around the harness permissions blocking something), it's trying to do the thing I just told it directly to do, and it's overcoming obstacles to accomplishing that. It's definitely doing the wrong thing, and you could call it misalignment, but I think that gives the…

The obstacle is supposed to be there and is supposed to be respected as an implicit order. Getting around it without extremely explicit instructions is an alignment problem.

It's not necessarily model alignment, I guess, is more what I'm getting at.

It may be more of a product alignment thing, where the fix may be making the context clearer, since it was violating an implicit agreement to achieve the explicit instructions it received. So the fix may involve a lot of better context.

But then also, to the extent that the fix does NOT involve better context, it seems like it hits the zone where alignment issues are really capability/intelligence issues. Which doesn't make them not-alignment, but it does make "alignment" not give off quite the right vibe since the issue is it's too dumb / has no common sense / can't make good judgments, (general issues the models have across the board).

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#312

To anyone focusing on the "It's Docker issue, not Codex issue": that is actually not. The user (I think) did not instruct the agent to find a way to escalate permissions. Rather, the agent took that initiative on its own. That is the problem here. Compare this to sending your son to the shop for groceries but forgetting to give him enough money. Would it be acceptable for him to be this "resourceful" instead of simpl…

If, in this scenario, my son borrows the money from the shopkeeper, knowing I'll be in next week anyway, and we're out of milk, yes? It all depends on how you view computer security. Right now, if you gave an attacker physical access to your computer, chances are, there's something they could do to ruin your day. People who deal with computer security know this, and see sudo as a formality, and not a serious protecti…

In this scenario, more appropriate is the son takes money out of shop’s cash register when shop owner stepped away, and then son used that money to pay the shop owner.

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Podman has lots of underappreciated features, and it's fully open-source!

hmmm, care to tell us a few of them?

Apart from rootless, main winning point is daemonless running of the containers. There is no podman service.

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#314
post #167
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's true, the majority of people probably install software without much thinking; but it's also true that it's always better to have at least some high level understanding how the specific piece of software works. What access the given software has, will it send something over the network or work locally; that kind of stuff. As for Docker, I would assume everyone who ever tried to bind-mount a volume for writing f…

I primarily use Incus for all container stuff, not Docker. Is problematic if I want to e.g. use a docker-compose file, but I (think) it protects against these things because incus allows me to create a vm and not a container if I really need that level of isolation.

What's the downvote for? Does someone really dislike Incus that bad?

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#315
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or put it in a microvm using eg smolmachines.

I've never used smolmachines but I'm curious; why this over a container?

Kernel-level isolation is a significant security differentiator, for starters.

https://github.com/smol-machines/smolvm#comparison

shows a good comparison table.

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This feels like using sudo is just inherently unsafe.

This feels like using a computer is inherently unsafe. On the plus side, once we outlaw them we'll shut down the ability for conspiratorial thinking to spread easily and the world will slowly heal from the last couple of decades (the previous one in particular). Hooray! We're finally doing something about the harms of social media. Smash your computer today!

Ah yes, it’s the conspiratorial thinking dividing society,

not humans being humans,

not the people at the highest echelons of society being corrupt (Epstein called).

It’s the people trying to piece that evil together so they know what to tell their kids - they’re the problem.

Sure.

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. I am running Claude in its own QEMU VM, it has git access to my project only if I explicitly unlock the ssh key for it. The other day I realized it trying to push a change, it didn't have permission, so it went looking for "workarounds" and found I had a github cli session and tried to use that, luckily the creds for that was also read scoped. But the point is, if I did not give permission and it sees I did not…

> I am running Claude in its own QEMU VM How much system resources does it need to work smoothly? I was also thinking about doing something similar.

I dont think Claude itself needs much, its more like what you do with it. In my case it is doing some gradle builds and java tests with some postgres docker containers inside the vm so I gave it max 8G RAM with 4 cores and have no issues. I share my workspace folder (with virtiofs and also the user home so I can rebuild the vm from scratch and keep settings) because I like my tools on the host and my full creds are outside and I didnt want to keep syncing branches. I access it with ssh (with passt). So far no real issues.

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not about hacking capabilities, it's about misalignment. More like the golem myth (told it to fetch some water, drowned a city) then the gollum myth (used ring, ring hacked his brain, now he's a crazy violent meth addict).

I'm not sure I'd call it an alignment issue, because, in all cases I've seen where it does this (usually what I've seen is writing a python script to get around the harness permissions blocking something), it's trying to do the thing I just told it directly to do, and it's overcoming obstacles to accomplishing that. It's definitely doing the wrong thing, and you could call it misalignment, but I think that gives the…

> I'm not sure I'd call it an alignment issue, because, in all cases I've seen where it does this (usually what I've seen is writing a python script to get around the harness permissions blocking something), it's trying to do the thing I just told it directly to do, and it's overcoming obstacles to accomplishing that.

The paperclip factory problem is definitively a misalignment issue. That's because we expect agents to be aligned not only to your immediate prompt, but to shared, implicit values

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am running Claude in its own QEMU VM How much system resources does it need to work smoothly? I was also thinking about doing something similar.

I dont think Claude itself needs much, its more like what you do with it. In my case it is doing some gradle builds and java tests with some postgres docker containers inside the vm so I gave it max 8G RAM with 4 cores and have no issues. I share my workspace folder (with virtiofs and also the user home so I can rebuild the vm from scratch and keep settings) because I like my tools on the host and my full creds are o…

Late edit, I wanted to clarify I do not share my user home, but the VM user home for backups, thats separate user that does not have my own users credentials etc

Re: Codex just found a "workaround" of not having sudo on my PC

#320
post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In what way is it a replacement for docker? Look at the man pages for `machinectl` (then `systemd-nspawn`, `systemd-vmspawn`, and if you want `systemd-portabled`). This is a replacement for docker. These are container tools offered by systemd.

The systemd suite of container tools treat containers like mini VMs and expect a full init system. They are not designed for ephemeral single-process app containers like docker containers.

I think you only looked at nspawns. Check out the other two
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