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Linux - Hidden Dates in the Linux Kernel
In order to prevent the reboot() system call being
called inadvertently, you must pass it a pair of magic values in the first two parameters. The first magic value is 0xfee1dead. The second magic value
is one of:
$ grep LINUX_REBOOT_MAGIC include/linux/*.h
include/linux/reboot.h:#define LINUX_REBOOT_MAGIC1 0xfee1dead
include/linux/reboot.h:#define LINUX_REBOOT_MAGIC2 672274793
include/linux/reboot.h:#define LINUX_REBOOT_MAGIC2A 85072278
include/linux/reboot.h:#define LINUX_REBOOT_MAGIC2B 369367448
include/linux/reboot.h:#define LINUX_REBOOT_MAGIC2C 537993216
These are dates of significance to Linus; hint
you can use perl to convert them into dates:
$ perl -e 'print localtime(672274793). "\n";'
Sun Apr 21 18:59:53 1991
This is the date that Linus first started writing Linux. The significance of other dates is left as an exercise for the reader ;-)
Special Requirements:
copy of the Linux source, grep, perl
Avg. Rating:    6.8 of 10 - (26 votes cast)
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Contributed By:
Anonymous on 06-04-2005
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Reviewed By:
sars, David Wolf
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on openSUSE 10.2 by systemz89
on openSUSE 10.2 by systemz89
Comments:
jimee writes:
These numbers are not timestamps in seconds since epoch. You have to convert them in hexadecimal to read a DDMMYYYY: $ printf "%x\n" 672274793 28121969 28/12/1969 is Linus' birthdate.
36 of 39 people found this comment helpful. Did you? Yes
koira writes:
I figured them out, but I won't tell. It is a neat exercise, and I learned a new command line command, printf. I figured I would give a hint. The second date is not May 12, 1996. I looked for about 15 mins before I figured it out. Even wikipedia has nothing for May 12, 1996. When you convert 85072278 to hex, you get a number starting with 5. Add a 0 to the beginning of that number. This is a pretty cool easter egg. I had fun.
2 of 13 people found this comment helpful. Did you? Yes


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