disabling services: update-rc.d vs. /etc/default/<package>

[Tilman Koschnick <lists@subnetz.org>]

Hi,

I'm packaging a daemon (gpsd), and I want to give the user the choice if
it should be started at boot time or not (it's for GPS receivers, which
are most likely not permanently attached to the computer).

I have a debconf question to this effect, and currently I am setting a
variable in /etc/default/gpsd: START_DAEMON="true|false".

Another way would be to use update-rc.d to handle symlinks in the
runlevel directories.

Pro /etc/default/<package>:
- There is one single location where the behaviour is configured, and
the user can either edit /etc/default/<package> or use debconf.

Pro update-rc.d:
- Seems to me that this is the more traditional SysV approach.
- User still can use /etc/init.d/<package> to start/stop the daemon.

I've seen examples for both in Debian. Is there any consent what the
better option is, or is there a historical move from one way to the
other?

Cheers, Til