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Re: Resolving policy and practice wrt sbin directories (traceroute)



>> Anthony Towns <aj@azure.humbug.org.au> writes:

 > traceroute is where it is because that's where it is on every other
 > UNIX

 $ ls -l /usr/etc/traceroute 
 -r-sr-xr-x    1 root     sys        22388 Jun  2  2000 /usr/etc/traceroute

 $ ls -l /usr/contrib/bin/traceroute
 -r-sr-xr-x   1 root       bin          32768 Aug 27  1998 /usr/contrib/bin/traceroute

 that argument is not what I'd call solid.  In fact the most convincing
 argument I read on that thread was "just because", which is, I think,
 what the original poster is questioning.  Dimmishing the issue with a
 "there are more important things to do" type of answer is just begging
 for the question "why do we have a policy at all then".  The whole is
 larger that the sum of its parts, methinks.

 > Technical excellence is more important than policy compliance, btw,
 > in all cases. Fortunately, they only very rarely conflict.

 Exactly.  When you have 500+ people working towards technical
 excellence you need something to bound the definition.  Not everyone's
 definition of technical excellence is going to agree on the details.
 Policy won't ever outline all the details, just a set of broad scope
 rules that permit you to work out the details yourself.

-- 
Marcelo             | "Worlds only harmonica-playing dog. Tuppence."
mmagallo@debian.org |         -- Gaspode the wonder dog
                    |            (Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures)



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