On Wed, Oct 06, 1999 at 08:31:02PM +1000, Brian May wrote: > In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> you write: > >> Config files are, by their nature, host-specific, and should not be in > >> /usr > > > >They are not. e.g. /etc/hosts should be the same across a pool. Nearly > >all files in /etc can be shared and none should be rewritten on the > >fly. > > Agreed. My diskless package needlessly has to copy the entire > contents of /etc for every host, since it cannot be shared. > > However, how would you distinguish a shareable config file from a > non-shareable config file? eg would {samba,squid,etc} be sharable??? > (not that you would normally run these on a diskless system). > > I think if you are going to use /usr/etc, programs should first check > /etc, in case the system administrator wishes to override the sharable > config file for the given host.
This is a good idea for programs that live in /usr/bin or /usr/sbin, but would require program support to check for configs in multiple locations. However, I suggest that programs living in /bin and /sbin MUST have their configs in /etc in case /usr is not available. > > IMHO, only a few files in /etc are not sharable, eg /etc/hostname > /etc/mailname, /etc/news/whoami (I may have these names wrong), possibly > mail configuration, network configuration (actually, this is sharable if > kernel level auto IP configuration is enabled). Please tell me if I missed > anything. See above. > > On the downside, it is possible that it might simplify my diskless > package (need to think about this more). Yuck - can't have that ;-). > > >Apart from /etc/mtab (which can be linked to /proc/mounts) normaly > >nothing gets written to /etc and / can be ro. For diskless systems > >/usr/etc and /usr/share/etc could reduce the size of the ramdisk or > >root fs needed to boot and more data could be shared across a pool. > > > >Alternatively /etc/share/, /etc/arch and /etc/local could be > >used. Just as one likes. > > I prefer /usr/etc, as this means a seperate mount point is > not required, as /usr is already shared. > -- > Brian May <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > -- > To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] > -- Steve Bowman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Buckeye, AZ Powered by Debian GNU/Linux <http://www.debian.org>