Ludovic Courtès (2015-11-24 15:48 +0300) wrote: > Alex Kost <alez...@gmail.com> skribis: > >> Ludovic Courtès (2015-11-23 17:31 +0300) wrote: > > [...] > >>>> Great! So is it OK to send a patch for adding ‘profile-file’ field? >>> >>> Hmm, I’m not sure if we want to give direct access to /etc/profile like >>> this. >> >> Oh, no! If there is one person (me) who wants to have a full control on >> his /etc/profile, there may be the others with the same wish. >> >>> The problem is that several things in there are here to make the system >>> work, and to to make it conform to the ‘operating-system’ declaration, >>> such as: >>> >>> >>> export LANG="en_US.utf8" >>> export TZ="Europe/Paris" >>> export >>> TZDIR="/gnu/store/rwvf6xqgsyb8bmpi7rwk9fildnwvzrv5-tzdata-2015c/share/zoneinfo" >>> >>> # Tell 'modprobe' & co. where to look for modules. >>> export LINUX_MODULE_DIRECTORY=/run/booted-system/kernel/lib/modules >> >> Yes, that's why I suggest to add a note to the manual about a danger of >> using this field. >> >>> The risk I see with adding a raw ‘profile-file’ option is that newcomers >>> may end up getting rid of such things without really noticing, and then >>> getting a broken system. >> >> But a newcomer will learn about this option only if (s)he reads the >> manual with the warning I've mentioned. For me, your phrase sounds >> like: «We will not provide "rm" command, because a newcomer may >> accidentally run "rm -rf ~"». Please give me an opportunity to shoot >> myself in the foot! >> >> Besides will the system really be broken? > > Yes.
I don't agree with your points, so it is "No" for me. >> What do you mean? > > I can already see the bug reports: “I specified the en_US.utf8 locale in > the declaration, but somehow I end up with the C locale”; “why doesn’t > modprobe find modules?”; “I’m stuck in the GMT timezone”, etc. etc. > > And only after 5 messages will we learn that the user wanted to add > *one* line to /etc/profile, did that via the ‘profile-file’ field, > without noticing that this would wipe out all the rest of the useful > stuff from there. Sorry again, but I read: «No, no, we really shouldn't provide "rm" command, because it can do a big harm!» If a user just blindly puts something in his operating-system declaration or runs "rm -rf ~", then (s)he deserves the harm (s)he gets. >>> What about instead giving a way to populate the top and/or bottom of >>> this file? Controversial parts, if any, could still be turned on and >>> off by adding or removing services that add these lines? >> >> It is better than nothing, but it is not sufficient IMO. Any part of >> /etc/profile can be controversial (you'll never know what a user would >> like to change), so I think providing an option to change this file >> completely is essential. >> >> But I agree that appending/prepending some lines may also be useful for >> those who like to keep the default /etc/profile and who just want to add >> something to it. > > OK. > > NixOS apparently takes in approach similar to that: > > https://github.com/NixOS/nixos/blob/master/modules/programs/bash/bash.nix > > There’s a bunch of high-level options like ‘shellAliases’, ‘promptInit’, > etc. that get pasted in /etc/profile or /etc/bashrc. In addition, > /etc/profile sources /etc/profile.local if available, and similarly for > /etc/bashrc. > > ‘shellInit’ in that file refers to ‘setEnvironment’, as defined here: > > https://github.com/NixOS/nixos/blob/master/modules/programs/environment.nix > > https://github.com/NixOS/nixos/blob/master/modules/config/shells-environment.nix > > Interestingly, that part does like ‘guix package --search-paths’ as > suggested at <http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=20255#41>, > but does it in Bash and without stat’ing files. Thanks for this NixOS info! > Anyway, I think the way forward is to make /etc/profile modular in > similar fashion. What about starting with an /etc/profile service that > can receive Bash snippets and paste them in the middle of the file, > right before: > > if [ -n "$BASH_VERSION" -a -f /etc/bashrc ] > then > # Load Bash-specific initialization code. > . /etc/bashrc > fi > > Does that make sense? I agree that a modular /etc/profile would be great, but only if *any* part of it can be changed or removed, otherwise this decision will have the same problem: one day there will appear users who would like to change the parts that cannot be changed. But still I prefer to have a straightforward way to set my own /etc/profile. Or maybe it would be good to have even a more general solution: a way to specify any file that goes to "/etc" dir, something like this: (operating-system ;; ... (etc-files ("hosts" (local-file "/home/me/guix/etc/hosts")) ("profile" (local-file "/home/me/guix/bash/my-favourite-etc-profile")) ("fstab" (local-file "/home/me/guix/etc/fstab")))) You will probably consider this decision evil, but for me it's a perfect solution. As I see it: - these 'etc-files' should have a priority over the default generated /etc files; - "guix system" command should report if these files override the default ones, and it can even create "/etc/foobar.default" so that a user could look at it any time; - and of course the manual should warn that 'etc-files' is a very dangerous option, blah, blah, blah. The most valuable thing for me is customizability, and I just can't stand the situation when developers refuse to provide a way to customize defaults for no reason (or just because it is potentially dangerous). I don't like the default grub.cfg, but I've never complained about it because there is "--no-grub" option, so I can install grub on my own and use my own grub config. This is great! :-) The problem with /etc files, is that they can't be edited directly, and operating-system doesn't provide a way to change any aspect of these files, so I always find things that I don't like and that can't be changed. This is bad! :-( > I can give it a try if you want. Sorry, but this is not what I want. I would like to have a full control on any aspect of my system. -- Alex