🚀 go-pugleaf

chess@watson.ibm.com (David M. Chess) writes:

> >could infect them by mistake. How are the DLL and DRV files loaded in
> >OS/2? If they are not loaded using any INT 21h/AX=4Bxxh function, then
> >it is rather unlikely that any of the currently known viruses will
> >infect them...

> No, no OS/2 call does an INT 21 at all; that's one of the main
> reasons that no DOS virus runs in native OS/2.  Operating system
> calls in OS/2 are done using Protect Mode constructs like call
> gates (I forget the details again!), not using INTs.       DC

OK, but suppose that the user opens a DOS window. Suppose also that
s/he runs an infected DOS program in this window and the virus becomes
resident. Does OS/2 access some DLLs in order to handle the running of
a DOS program in a DOS window? Are those accesses visible to the
program running in the DOS window? If they are not, then none of the
currently existing viruses will infect a DLL file and there is no need
to scan such files...

Another possibility is a virus like Frodo, which (erroneously)
infects files with different extensions, because it thinks they are
COM or EXE. But Frodo's criteria for executable extension does not
classify "DLL" as such and I don't know other viruses which do the
same stupidity...

So, it seems that there is indeed no need to scan the DLL files,
right? Or am I missing something?

Regards,
Vesselin
- -- 
Vesselin Vladimirov Bontchev          Virus Test Center, University of Hamburg
Tel.:+49-40-54715-224, Fax: +49-40-54715-226      Fachbereich Informatik - AGN
< PGP 2.1 public key available on request. > Vogt-Koelln-Strasse 30, rm. 107 C
e-mail: bontchev@fbihh.informatik.uni-hamburg.de    D-2000 Hamburg 54, Germany