Bug#249597: texmf: Leaves spurious tempfiles around
On Tue, May 18, 2004 at 03:50:41PM +0200, Frank K?ster wrote:
> reassign 249597 tetex-bin
> stop
>
> Jeroen van Wolffelaar <jeroen@wolffelaar.nl> schrieb:
>
> > Package: tetex-base
> > Version: 2.0.2-8
> > Severity: minor
> >
> > I irregularly find files like /tmp/updm30nxXC on my filesystem. They
> > contain stuff like I quoted below.
> >
> > My guess is (didn't really research this fully yet) that some postinst
> > or something leaves those behind without cleaning them afterwards.
>
> Yes, this is from tetex-bin's postinst. And it is left there on purpose
> - you are informed about this:
>
> echo "Output of initex is in $TEMPFILE"
> echo "Output of updmap is in ${MAPTEMP}"
>
> This is useful for debugging, and I can't see how it violates any good
> practice, policy or FHS.
>
> So, for me this is not a bug. I would suggest to close it, but feel free
> to elaborate and convince me.
You're right it doesn't really obviously violate the FHS -- but it does
clutter the $TMPDIR, which by default isn't auto-cleaned. Note that the
FHS says that /tmp is for "temporary files", and the files here don't
fall in the category in my opinion (but it is a subtle).
The purpose of this file is debugging, so in fact it is some kind of
logfile. IMHO, /var/log is thus the right place for these files, where
it could and should be arranged that those files are rotated away after
a suitable time. initex and updmap can then be made to always log there
-- if you think that's useful in general (if it isn't, why is postinst
saving it then?).
--Jeroen
--
Jeroen van Wolffelaar
Jeroen@wolffelaar.nl (also for Jabber & MSN; ICQ: 33944357)
http://Jeroen.A-Eskwadraat.nl
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