Bug#60099: sethostid returns '-1' when trying to set the hostid

[Igor Bubel <bubel@online-service.de>]

Package: libc6
Version: 2.1.3-6

When I use sethostid() to set the hostid, sethostid returns '-1' and
perror() reports 'sethostid: No such file or directory'. After 'mkdir
/var/adm/' (thanks to 'njs' from irc.debian.org) it works correctly and
creates '/var/adm/hostid'. I couldn't find the part about
'/var/adm/hostid' in any documentation. This should be mentioned
somewhere.

Here's the source I used:

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
#include<stdio.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
#include<errno.h>
#include<unistd.h>

void main(int argc, char **argv)
{
  unsigned long hid;

  if(argc == 1)
    {
      hid = gethostid();
      printf("hid: %lX ... %li\n", hid, hid);
    }else{
      if( 1 != sscanf(argv[1], "%lx", &hid) )
        printf("error\n");
      else
        sethostid(hid);
      switch (errno)
        {
        case EPERM:
          printf("no permission\n");
          break;
          
        case ENOSYS:
          printf("ENOSYS stuff\n");
          break;

        default:
          perror("sethostid: ");
          printf("errno: %s\n", strerror(errno));
        }
    }
}
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