Re: Simple solution to pre-installation configuration

["Richard G. Roberto" <richr@Bear.COM>]

On Sun, 26 Jan 1997, Christoph Lameter wrote:

All this sounded good for a simple start, but ...
> 
> Guidelines:
> -----------
> 
> 1. The package will never refer to /var/lib/config/packagename for
>    configuration information except at installation time. The user might
>    run a reconfiguration at any time without activating that new
>    configuration.  The information in /var/lib/config is only to be
>    consulted during installation.

How will package upgrades know what intermitten changed values to
use if the user doesn't update the /var/lib/config/packagename
file?  Shouldn't the user be able to expect continuity across
upgrades instead of having to reconfigure at each
install/upgrade?  I think this must be considered.  I realize
that packages may change and old values may not exist in new
versions, new values may be added, etc.   But I think its worth
it to take this a little further to accomidate upgrades before
letting it loose.  Adding an option or two to the utility to
either prompt for reconfiguration or just use existing values or
just use new defaults would be one way to handle this simply.

Also adding something to each packages doc directory describing
the configurable variables and where they are would allow users
to edit the files manually to maintain them (in the absence of an
automated maintenance utitility).  It may even be possible to
offer a diff on the existing variables and the new variables as
an option and either present to the user or log it to a file.

> 
> 2. During package installation the postinst/preinst/postrm/prerm scripts
>    should not prompt for any values but have the configure script do the
>    job.

sounds good.

> 
> 3. The configure script will only write information to
>    /var/lib/config/packagename and not change any other configuration files
>    on the system.

this too.

Thanks

Richard G. Roberto
richr@bear.com
011-81-3-3437-7967 - Tokyo, Japan


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