Re: Intent To Split: netbase
Anthony Towns wrote:
>
> FHS discuss people: where should traceroute go? Tradition dictates
> /usr/sbin, the FHS seems to indicate /usr/bin would be more appropriate.
I think it should be in /usr/bin, certainly if it is setuid. So should ping,
and mount and umount. It is most annoying if you insert a floppy or cd-rom
as a user, read it through a well-known automount point such as /misc/cdrom,
and then cannot extract it anymore because:
/misc/cdrom is not in /etc/fstab and you are not root
- the error message that umount spits out on Linux when a non-root user
tries umount and the filesystem does not have the user attribute in
/etc/fstab, par force because /misc/cdrom was not listed at all.
ifconfig is also necessary for users: A user types "telnet blahblah",
the system dials out, acquires an IP address, and then the user will want
to set the DISPLAY variable on the remote system. If that remote system
does not discover automatically, then ifconfig is one way to find out.
Many tasks that were traditionally "reserved for the administrator" are
no longer so, or not in all cases. If Linux (Unix) wants to make an impact
on end user systems, it has to cater for users which:
o know little about how to administrate a Linux system
o do not want to know
o pay $50 call-out charge for a system administrator
o pay $1 a minute for telephone support
Such a callout charge may be acceptable if you switch on the system and it
tells you the filesystem is corrupt, you should check it. But to extract
a CD-Rom ? Would you buy a washing machine where you need to call out an
electrician to switch it on ?
I know rebooting is a dirty word in the Linux and Unix community, but
anything that can with good probability be achieved by rebooting or
power-cycling the machine should not "require a system administrator".
The appropriate commands should have a setuid mode that prevents some of
the more obvious ways to create havoc - such as ping fretting on non-root
requestetd flood pings.
Thomas
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