Hello,

I was reading couple of howtos (yeah!) about read-only / with
/etc as mfs.

I suppose these howtos overlook problem with unavailability of some
important files.

I suppose boot and init needs some files in /etc before running
/etc/rc, like ttys and master.passwd etc... If you mount /etc
as mfs over "old" /etc used by init, I think you can see following:

* you cannot modify files hidden under monted over /etc

...and...

* init in single user would ask you different root's password
  then used in "normal" state

I apologize if anybody would complain that this is not supported
solution but anyway, what is your workaround and what do you
think about solution below?

jirib

files before init:
==================
/etc/boot.conf

files needed by init:
=====================
/etc/rc
/etc/ttys
/etc/passwd
/etc/master.passwd
/etc/ptmp # ignore!
/etc/pwd.db
/etc/spwd.db
/etc/login.conf

files used by /etc/rc before `mount'
====================================
/etc/defaultdomain # ignored by me
/etc/rc.conf # this could be theoretically skipped
             # if moved later in /etc/rc
/etc/raid$dev.conf # ignored by me
/etc/fstab

scenario:
=========

* mkdir /proto_etc
* cp -Rp /etc/* /proto_etc
* mkdir /pre_etc
* cd /pre_etc
* for i in boot.conf rc ttys passwd master.passwd pwd.db spwd.db login.conf 
fstab rc.conf ; do
      ln /etc/$i $i
  done
* mount_mfs -s 20M -P /proto-etc swap /etc
* rsync -vhaz --delete \
  --exclude boot.conf \
  --exclude rc \
  --exclude ttys \
  --exclude passwd \
  --exclude master.passwd \
  --exclude pwd.db \
  --exclude spwd.db \
  --exclude login.conf \
  --exclude fstab \
  --exclude rc.conf /etc/ /proto_etc/
* cd /etc
* for i in boot.conf rc ttys passwd master.passwd pwd.db spwd.db login.conf 
fstab rc.conf ; do
      cat /etc/$i > /pre_etc/$i
  done

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