me and my friend got into an argument about who's box had been running longer, and he said I could run forkbomb removed. to check the uptime.

I tried running 'man forkbomb removed' and it said
bash: syntax error near unexpected token `('

The command to check uptime is

What your friend gave you was a "fork bomb"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fork_bomb

--C

1 members found this post helpful.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you weren't
playing a prank on unsuspecting netizens, but were indeed a victim
of a friends idea of "fun".

I edited the thread title and content none the less so unsuspecting
visitors don't try that "method of reading uptime".



Cheers,
Tink

... Which would have meant I would have had to restart my computer, without ever getting a chance to see my uptime. That's actually pretty clever

Any suggestions on how I can get him back?

Tell him to activate biometric authentication, a new feature that comes along with newest update of the linux kernel by adding the following line to his /etc/sudoers file:

root ALL (SEC BIOX)_AUTH ALL HIGH

Can`t tell he will believe you, though. (Probably not)

Posted this just to unlock the full benefits of my LQ account =)

BTW, don't do this (or, make sure you have an extra terminal window open and logged as root to fix things later..)
Otherwise, you may end up unable to login as sudo anymore, as all this does is add syntax errors to your sudoers file.

That will not work when the user edits sudoers in the correct way with using visudo.

Why bother? While revenge may be sweet, is it really worth it? Would a real "friend" really want you to fork-bomb your server?

Take consolation in the fact that you were smart enough not to run commands you were not familiar with . . . . . or did you?

Oh well, something new to do: Forkbomb my own PC and try to defuse it as per the wikipedia article.

Right ... and this is not behaviour we want to encourage at LQ. With these words I'm closing this.