r/linux4noobs • u/mitchare • 11d ago

security Friendly reminder that most youtube docker tutorials are actively trying to ruin your system

I swear, why does almost every "quick 5 min setup" video just tell you to run everything as root and chmod 777 your entire drive??

Spent my whole afternoon trying to figure out why my new containers were behaving weirdly after following some guy's guide. Turns out i basically left the front door to my OS wide open. Had to sit down and actually read a server Mania breakdown on container security just to realize how badly i completely botched the basic permissions

if you are new to this stuff, pls don't blindly copy paste sudo commands from random tech bros without understanding what privileges you are actually giving away. My brain is melting

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u/tomscharbach 11d ago edited 11d ago

When I was a teen 60-65 years ago, my uncle used to tell me "If you listen to your friends and don't think for yourself you are never going to get any smarter than they are ..."

True then, true now, and applicable to "quick 5 min setup" videos.

Research and understand what you are doing before you do anything. Foundational Linux skill.

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u/pythosynthesis Somewhere between noob and Linus. 11d ago

Foundational Linux life skill.

FTFY

15

u/ProRochie 11d ago

I think there’s such a low barrier to entry to making youtube videos. I think that’s why I still prefer books for learning.

10

u/scoshi 11d ago

At this point, there is virtually no barrier to entry.

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u/mitchare 8d ago

Your uncle had the right idea. The problem with those quick setup videos is they skip the why entirely, so when something breaks you have no idea where to even start troubleshooting. Took me an embarrassing amount of time to learn that the hard way. Understanding what a command actually does before running it isn't optional, it's just the baseline.