[WEB4LIB] two questions on viruses

[Thomas Bennett]

If your PCs are not running a firewall to block other ports incoming
then there is always a potential especially with MS Windows.

The copy command, on MS Windows, allows /A for ascii and /B for binary. 
You can copy an ascii file to binary or a binary file to ascii.  I think
the default is ascii in which case when you copy the binary file using
the ascii mode the file will probably end at the first EOF (end of file)
character and truncate the rest of the file.  If I remember correctly
eof is 0E 0A (hex) which is not an EOF in a binary file.  If you copy
those to files together using /B you should something closer to the sum
of their sizes.


Thomas


COPY /?

COPY [/V] [/N] [/Y | /-Y] [/Z] [/A | /B ] source [/A | /B]
     [+ source [/A | /B] [+ ...]] [destination [/A | /B]]

  source       Specifies the file or files to be copied.
  /A           Indicates an ASCII text file.
  /B           Indicates a binary file.
  destination  Specifies the directory and/or filename for the new file(s).
  /V           Verifies that new files are written correctly.
  /N           Uses short filename, if available, when copying a file with a
               non-8dot3 name.
  /Y           Suppresses prompting to confirm you want to overwrite an
               existing destination file.
  /-Y          Causes prompting to confirm you want to overwrite an
               existing destination file.
  /Z           Copies networked files in restartable mode.


On Fri, 2005-01-07 at 06:20, John Fitzgibbon wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Some of our PCs make the library catalogue available (a web site) and
> only the library catalogue available to the public. It is not possible
> to access any other web site or run any Office program on these PCs. Can
> these PCs become infected by a virus or worm? There is no anti-virus
> software running on them.
> 
> Secondly, I read that a virus attaches itself either to the beginning or
> end of a program and launches itself when that program is run. As an
> experiment, I took two programs, Notepad.exe and NoteTab.exe: I copied
> them into one file using a DOS command. The result is a much smaller
> file than the sum of its parts which does not launch the two programs in
> quick succession, as I expected. Any ideas on why this might be so?
> 
> Regards
> John
> 
> John Fitzgibbon
> 
> Galway Public Library
> Island House
> Cathedral Square
> Galway
> Ireland
> 
> p: 00 353 91 562471
> f: 00 353 91 565039
> w: http://www.galwaylibrary.ie
> 
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