On Mon, Apr 03, 2006 at 12:38:12AM +0300, Lars Wirzenius wrote:
> Current policy states in section 9.3.3.2 ("Running initscripts") the
> following: "The use of invoke-rc.d to invoke the /etc/init.d/*
> initscripts is strongly recommended[51], instead of calling them
> directly."
> Footnote 51 further says: "In the future, the use of invoke-rc.d to
> invoke initscripts shall be made mandatory. Maintainers are advised to
> switch to invoke-rc.d as soon as possible."
> I propose that the future has arrived.
> I ran the attached script on all binary packages in sid/main/i386, and
> it reported 134 packages that I then analyzed manually. There were only
> two false positives (both mentioned how to run their init.d script in a
> message to the user, but didn't run it themselves). All other reported
> packages were true positives. I have attached the list as well.
> Almost all of the packages in the list are either dict-* packages
> (seemingly from the same template), have code from an old debhelper
> version (so a rebuild might suffice), or are otherwise pretty easy to
> fix. Even though the number of packages are fairly large, it is my
> opinion that it should be possible to keep the transition period quite
> short, weeks at most, and I'm willing to put some time into it.
> See also bug #353659 against lintian to add a check for this.
> I would like to see this policy change happen in time for all packages
> to be updated in etch. This would mean that sysadmins can, finally, rely
> on policy-rc.d working reliably. Also it means that it would be easier
> to build chroots, and not have to worry about services and daemons being
> started inside them unnecessarily.
> I realize that my script doesn't find all problematic packages. It is
> meant as a quick estimate. For proper testing, I have recently
> implemented changes into piuparts that should make it possible to find
> all problematic packages: in my development version /proc now gets
> mounted (ergo, start-stop-daemon works), and after packages have been
> installed, lsof checks that no processes run inside the chroot. This
> will, I hope, catch packages that don't use invoke-rc.d when they
> should.
> Are there any objections to this proposed change? (If there are none
> within a few days, I'll file the appropriate bug against debian-policy.)
No objections, I think this is a good idea.
Cheers,
--
Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world.
vorlon@debian.org http://www.debian.org/
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