root in tar file

[Marcus Brinkmann <Marcus.Brinkmann@ruhr-uni-bochum.de>]

Hi,

I probably created some confusion about the root of the tar file.
In 1999, I started with bin/, etc, so that the tar file extracts in the
current directory. Then, I switched over to gnu/bin, etc, so that 
all files in the tar file are prefixed by /gnu.

I switched back now. The hurd-20000925.tar.gz which I uploaded now
extracts in the local directory, and I will stick to that.

Usually, I think that tar files should not extract into the local directory.
But this is a very special case, as it contains the base of an entire
operating system, and prefixing it requires to use gnu/ as the mountpoint
or create a symlink or move the files after extraction. This is also
consistent with the Debian base.tar.gz.

So, please check all install guides that they make the correct assumption.
I think the easy guide does it right (but please double check, Matthew),
and the small guide at debian.org does it right as well. I don't know about
the other guides.

People should always check the content with tar tzf before extracting
anyway.

Thanks,
Marcus