[bug-gv] Re: Bug#583316: /usr/bin/gv: Insecure gs workaround "gs -P-"

[Bernhard R. Link]

* address@hidden <address@hidden> [100527 06:39]:
> I have been using a wrapper around gs that sets both -P- -dSAFER.
> That seems to work fine for viewing PS files, but does NOT allow
> gv to work for PDFs: the (first?) invoked gs cannot have either of
> those "security options" when attempting "gv some.pdf".
>
> As with PS files, "gv /tmp/some.pdf" first does "chdir /tmp" then
> invokes gs, which is rather unsafe without -P-.

I guess the reason why it changes the directory and why -P- is not
working here is that the pdf is opened by some postscript code and will
not find it with relative path.

There seems explicit code in gv to make sure that filename is always
relative which has a comment:
"/* Strip off directory from p to satisfy GS 8.00 security change */"

I wonder what that is about...

And it's really quite annoying that gs seems to have no option to add .
in the search path after everything else.

        Bernhard R. Link
-- 
"Never contain programs so few bugs, as when no debugging tools are available!"
        Niklaus Wirth