Where should run-time state files go?

[Thomas Hood <jdthood0@yahoo.co.uk>]

So far as I have been able to discover, neither Debian policy
nor the FHS 2.2 states clearly whether or not "variable" files
may be stored in the /etc/ hierarchy.  (I use 'variable' here in
the sense of the FHS -- modified in normal operation without
administrator intervention.)  I have an experimental package
that contains some variable files that cannot go in /var/ because
/var/ is not always available early enough in the boot sequence.
It seems that these files have to go in /etc/, along with such
files as mtab and ifstate.  However, some people think that /etc/
should be purged of variable files.  Could policy be clarified
so that it either explicitly permits variable files in /etc/ or
else says where else they should be put instead?

-- 
Thomas Hood <jdthood0@yahoo.co.uk>