CS 132 Readings

Note: All reading responses are to be written individually, even if your other homework assignments are produced jointly with a partner. (You may discuss your answers with your classmates, though.)

For Thursday, September 6:

Read Chapter 1 in the Dragon Book.

Also, read Ken Thompson's lecture Reflections on Trusting Trust, concentrating on Stages II and III. Bring written answers to the following questions to class:

  1. Summarize the evil trick being suggested in Stage III.
  2. Suppose we suspected that some Linux distributions, including the one used on Knuth, were affected in this manner. What could we do?