Aha!! That was it! After Tim's encouragement, I tried Spambayes again with the data execution prohibition disabled, and it worked. Maybe some of the other reported crashes have a similar origin. But my own experience suggests that other Windows apps have similar problems with the option, which I suspect will lead most people not to use it. Maybe other manufacturers won't adopt it anyway. Alas, I dug myself another hole while working on Spambayes last night. I'll seek help for that one in a separate message. Bob

-----Original Message----- From: Tim Peters [mailto:tim.peters@gmail.com] Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2006 12:55 PM To: Coe, Bob Cc: spambayes@python.org Subject: Re: [Spambayes] Outlook plugin crash

[Coe, Bob]

...

Can someone with a knowledge of the plugin code tell me whether it violates the modern fad of scrupulously avoiding the execution of data? Old-time coders like me used to do it all the time. (You can get away with it even in recursive and reentrant programs if you're careful.) But it's considered a security risk today, and the GX620 has a factory-preset BIOS option to prevent it. During the weekend, after I sent my original note, I found a program that wouldn't run on my computer until I disabled that option. I'm wondering now whether I ought to make another run at Spambayes with the option turned off. Any advice for me?

Python never executes data, but _something_ invoked when SpamBayes runs does. There are long discussions of this on the SB bug tracker, but SourceForge appears to be hosed at the moment so I can't get a reference for you now. Look for bug 988095.

It's definitely worth trying SB with the option disabled.