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Re: of virtual packages and services



On Mon, May 22, 2000 at 12:23:00PM -0400, Ben Collins wrote:
> Just a thought on the fingerd thread. What about having a general policy
> for network services in that perform a function. Basically it would say
> something like:
> 
> 	A package which provides a network service can opt to Provide this
> 	service via a virtual package. The name of the virtual package
> 	provided is in the format "<serv>-service" where <serv> is the
> 	corresponding name in /etc/services that matches the standard port
> 	of the service that it provides. A package cannot provide a
> 	service unless it meets the requirements of that service. It also
...


This is a nice proposal, nothing against it but....

> 
> This would seem to cover all current and future instances of this
> reoccuring situation.

...no it would not. The whole discussion was fuelled by various daemons happily 
messing with entries in /etc/inetd.conf.

You proposal is a nice addition to policy, which I'd like to see accepted, but it 
does not solve this (and not only this) particular problem.

For this, there should be some central authority deciding about
/etc/inetd.conf. update-inetd is a good try, but not complete enough
Something more like update-alternatives could work.

<dream mode>

Package postinst should do something like: 
update-inetd-entry finger stream tcp nowait nobody /usr/sbin/efingerd

and update-inetd-entry is a hypotetical program which comments out other
finger entries, adds my finger entry, automagically adding tcp wrappers if
they are installed.

on remove, it comments this particular entry out
on purge, it deletes the entry (either commented or not)
(pre|post)rm just calls 
update-inetd-entry --comment-out --service=finger --server=/usr/sbin/efingerd
or
update-inetd-entry --remove --service=finger --server=/usr/sbin/efingerd

and then (analogous to update-alternatives), it uncomments one of
remaining daemons (if any) providing this service

</dream mode>

update-inetd is a first step in this direction, but only a first step.

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