Re: [Tails-dev] disabling MAC spoofing by default in VM's [

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Author: intrigeri
Date:  
To: The Tails public development discussion list
Subject: Re: [Tails-dev] disabling MAC spoofing by default in VM's [
Hi,

anonym wrote (25 Nov 2013 19:24:51 GMT) :
> 21/11/13 09:17, intrigeri wrote:
>> I'm concerned about the impact on our test suite: it seems suboptimal
>> to (automatically) test code paths that are different from the ones
>> most users will go through.


> Even if we add a comprehensive cucumber feature that tests all scenarios
> we think matter for both cases (i.e. enabled and disabled)?


This would definitely be better.

However... when we find ourselves in a position when we can base
implementation decisions on "let's have more automated tests", then
I'm happy, but I don't think it would be wise to act as if we were
there yet.

>> IIRC we're setting a kernel cmdline
>> parameter when running the test suite, so perhaps this changing of
>> defaults could be disabled when a testing environment is detected?


> This would be both easy and appropriate, yes.


> Another approach is to change the default only for known problematic VMs
> (currently only VirtualBox), which is made easy since virt-what tells us
> which VM it detects. We this we would *by default* spoof the MAC address
> of Tails in the scenario where someone runs Tails in a e.g.
> libvirt/qeumu with a bridged adapter on a hostile network (it's up to
> the user to then also spoof the much more important *real* MAC address
> of the host computer). A small gain, I suppose.


I agree it's a small gain, compared to the simpler and more robust
(not depending on what specific string virt-what outputs) "don't
change the defaults when a testing environment is detected".

Cheers!
--
intrigeri
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