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Re: ifupdown writes to /etc... a bug?



Hello. Seem not everyone has stopped, so i don't need to refrain
throwing my 2 zorkmids anymore.

On Fri, Mar 21, 2003 at 12:10:20AM +0100, Goswin Brederlow wrote:

> Emile van Bergen <emile-deb@evbergen.xs4all.nl> writes:
> > For those still interested in this thread,

I am.

> > A: rcS.d scripts may assume /mem to be ram-based (that's probably too
> > much to ask)

Yes, too much, sorry :-P

> Why not use /etc/mem-skel/ as skeleton and /var/something for actual
> states from the last boot (although I don't realy see a point in
> restoring and saving thing from/to /var, why not use var instead)

I'd say, don't preserve anything in /mem. Use /etc/mem-skel for
directory structure and permissions. 

> Why should /mem be ram based? Any writeable fs would do for ABC. For
> people who only want one writeable fs how is the following option D:

We should allow it to be ram based, anyway. I don't think keeping
anything persistant in it would be really useful.

> D: /mem might exist in /etc/fstab
> 1. check root fs and mount -o remount /, possibly rw
> 2. mount /mem if present
> [...]

Sound quite good to me. However consider the following...

This is more about the "/mem or /run" question. IMHO, it would be
meaningful just to move volatile data from /var into something else
(let's say /vlt). We would move /var/lock and /var/run to /vlt/lock and
/vlt/run. Symlink old ones to new ones.

The very nature of this directory would allow us to require it being
available at boot : it's small and doesn't need persistance across
reboots. Let it on the root if you don't bother. Make a small disk
partition if you want / ro. Use a tmpfs if you're diskless.

The boot sequence would be something like :

E: /vlt, in fstab
1. check root fs and mount -o remount /, possibly rw
2. grep /vlt /etc/fstab && mount /vlt
3. rm -rf /vlt/* ; cp -a /etc/vlt/* /vlt
4. remount / and /vlt, or just cp /proc/mounts /vlt/run/mtab
(alternatilvely, if no symlinks are needed in /etc/vlt,
 cp --preserve=mode,ownership at 3., and don't do anything at 4., and
 have /etc/vlt/run/mtab -> /proc/mounts.)

I think all this stuff would be a good compromise between just /run, and
some for-everything /mem. It splits /var in a logical way, that enables
us solving our problems... If you're not conservative at all, you can
move /tmp to /vlt/tmp (which would be just logical), and then you've not
increased the count of top level directories, you've even eliminated the
"limited" scope of /tmp.

-- 
Jeremie Koenig <sprite@sprite.fr.eu.org>



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