Re: Hamm Bug Stamp-Out List for June 25, 1998
Hi,
>>"Dale" == Dale Scheetz <dwarf@polaris.net> writes:
Dale> On 26 Jun 1998, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
Dale> Thanks for quoting Policy on this. Upon reading the "actual" text, I don't
Dale> think this policy applies to libc6-dev.
>>
>> 3.3.5. Symbolic links
>> ---------------------
>>
>> In general, symbolic links within a toplevel directory should be
>> relative, and symbolic links pointing from one toplevel directory into
>> another should be absolute. (A toplevel directory is a sub-directory
>> of the root directory `/'.)
Dale> Note: "from one toplevel directory into another"
Actually, you have pointed out a bug in the wording of the
Policy manual; I shall file it anon. I was involved in formulating
the policy; the intent was definitely not to excude link to and from
deeper in the heirarchy.
The intent was to prohibit relative symbolic links that
traversed the root (/) of the file system. This allows people to
mount the top level directories where they wish, and create symbolic
links to satisfy the FSSTND requirements.
The sense was that this would take into account the
majority of the installations out there, and this trade off between
absolute and relative links was, in the opinion of the policy list,
the best we could achieve (and indeed this was a compromise, there
were some who were against all absolute links, and others against all
relatie links, and we compromised on this)
How about this:
______________________________________________________________________
In general, symbolic links within a toplevel directory should be
relative, and symbolic links pointing from inside one toplevel
directory into another should be absolute. (A toplevel directory is
a sub-directory of the root directory `/'.) In other words, relative
symbolic links should never traverse the root directory `/'.
______________________________________________________________________
Does this clarify the intent of the policy team better?
Dale> The links are from /usr/lib, which is a subdirectory of a top level
Dale> directory. Yes, it points to a top level directory, but that only satifies
Dale> one half of the above criterion.
Dale> I guess I'm just stupid ;-) but I don't understand what the example is
Dale> trying to tell me.
% ln -s /usr/local/src/../lib/../share/emacs/site-lisp/gnus/../bbdb junk
This is deprecated. You should use, instead,
% ln -s /usr/local/share/emacs/site-lisp/bbdb junk
manoj
--
"Gun control: Hitting what you aim at." Author Unknown
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@acm.org> <http://www.datasync.com/%7Esrivasta/>
Key C7261095 fingerprint = CB D9 F4 12 68 07 E4 05 CC 2D 27 12 1D F5 E8 6E
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