Part VII — What the lock can't do

Two honest limits — the ones most likely to mislead if they're dropped:

Plain-language ceiling #3 — the lock is proven on Linux only. On Linux the doorkeeper has been tested against real break-in attempts and held. On Mac buildings the lock is advice, not a proven lock (it hasn't been tested the same way). On Windows there's no lock to hand out at all.

Plain-language ceiling #4 — it keeps a careless worker's mess inside the room; it does not stop someone who already holds the building's master key. The room protects you from the worker going wrong. It is not designed to stop the building owner, or anyone who already has full run of the premises. And there are stronger locks that simply haven't been added yet. The optional "only the foreman holds the pen" rule doesn't change this: it trusts the owner's own computer, so someone on it with the clerk's key is beyond it too.

The honest way to describe any of these locks is "it holds as far as it's been tested" — never "unbreakable."