95 lines
3.7 KiB
Plaintext
95 lines
3.7 KiB
Plaintext
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"The Worm Before Christmas"
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by Clement C. Morris
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(a.k.a. David Bradley, Betty Cheng, Hal Render,
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Greg Rogers, and Dan LaLiberte)
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Twas the night before finals, and all through the lab
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Not a student was sleeping, not even McNabb.
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Their projects were finished, completed with care
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In hopes that the grades would be easy (and fair).
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The students were wired with caffeine in their veins
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While visions of quals nearly drove them insane.
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With piles of books and a brand new highlighter,
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I had just settled down for another all nighter ---
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When out from our gateways arose such a clatter,
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I sprang from my desk to see what was the matter;
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Away to the console I flew like a flash,
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And logged in as root to fend off a crash.
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The windows displayed on my brand new Sun-3,
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Gave oodles of info --- some in 3-D.
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When, what to my burning red eyes should appear
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But dozens of "nobody" jobs. Oh dear!
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With a blitzkrieg invasion, so virulent and firm,
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I knew in a moment, it was Morris's Worm!
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More rapid than eagles his processes came,
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And they forked and exec'ed and they copied by name:
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"Now Dasher! Now Dancer! Now, Prancer and Vixen!
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On Comet! On Cupid! On Donner and Blitzen!
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To the sites in .rhosts and host.equiv
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Now, dash away! dash away! dash away all!"
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And then in a twinkling, I heard on the phone,
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The complaints of the users. (Thought I was alone!)
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"The load is too high!" "I can't read my files!"
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"I can't send my mail over miles and miles!"
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I unplugged the net, and was turning around,
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When the worm-ridden system went down with a bound.
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I fretted. I frittered. I sweated. I wept.
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Then finally I core dumped the worm in /tmp.
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It was smart and pervasive, a right jolly old stealth,
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And I laughed, when I saw it, in spite of myself.
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A look at the dump of that invasive thread
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Soon gave me to know we had nothing to dread.
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The next day was slow with no network connections,
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For we wanted no more of those pesky infections.
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But in spite of the news and the noise and the clatter,
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Soon all became normal, as if naught were the matter.
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Then later that month while all were away,
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A virus came calling and then went away.
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The system then told us, when we logged in one night:
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"Happy Christmas to all! (You guys aren't so bright.)"
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[ Note: The machines dasher.cs.uiuc.edu,
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dancer.cs.uiuc.ed, prancer.cs.uiuc.edu, etc. have
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been renamed deer1, deer2, deer3, etc. so as not
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to confuse the already burdened students who use
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those machines. We regret that this poem reflects
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the older naming scheme and hope it does not confuse
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the network adminstrator at your site. -Ed.]
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X-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-X
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Another file downloaded from: NIRVANAnet(tm)
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& the Temple of the Screaming Electron Jeff Hunter 510-935-5845
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Rat Head Ratsnatcher 510-524-3649
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Burn This Flag Zardoz 408-363-9766
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realitycheck Poindexter Fortran 415-567-7043
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Lies Unlimited Mick Freen 415-583-4102
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Specializing in conversations, obscure information, high explosives,
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arcane knowledge, political extremism, diversive sexuality,
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insane speculation, and wild rumours. ALL-TEXT BBS SYSTEMS.
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Full access for first-time callers. We don't want to know who you are,
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where you live, or what your phone number is. We are not Big Brother.
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"Raw Data for Raw Nerves"
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X-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-X
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