Re: /root -> /home/kmfahey; /usr/doc -> /usr/share/doc

[Joe Block <jpb@creol.ucf.edu>]

Kerne Fahey wrote:
> 
> I have two very vague & general questions:
> 
> 1) On my linux box (no other flesh&blood users besides me; it's a laptop),
> I'm interested in emptying root's home directory, removing it, and making
> a symbolic link to my home directory, /home/kmfahey . This is for various
> aesthetic and convenience reasons, mostly so I'm not without my .*rc files
> when root, and so that 'cd' as root takes me to my home directory. Would this
> be a horrible mistake? (Would it be or create a security hole, or *really*
> confuse linux in some way?)

This is a bad idea.  You really want root to have a minimal .profile and
so forth so that when you boot into single user mode you don't run into
problems with root expecting to find files that aren't available any
more.  This would be an especially bad idea if /home isn't on the same
partition as /root is - I don't think single user mode will be happy if
it can't access ~root, which would make things awkward if you have to go
to runlevel 1 for repairs later.

If you really want to have your environment available when you're root,
use sudo to run commands, they'll inherit all your environment variables
that way.  You can just 'sudo bash' where you'd currently 'su' if you
need a root shell instead of just running a single command as root.

> 2) On that same linux box, I'm interested in [carefully] moving the contents
> of /usr/doc to /usr/share/doc , then removing /usr/doc and creating a symlink
> in its place to /usr/share/doc . This, also, is for various aesthetic and
> convenience reasons, mostly because of the FHS, and because I'd really like
> dhelp_parse to shut up about files in /usr/doc every time I'm apt-getting
> something. Would .this. be a horrible mistake?

While you can do this, I don't recommmend it - the whole point of a nice
packaging system is that you let it manage the files it installs and you
manage the files you install.  FHS will or will not eventually make it
into debian - if you custom hack your machine to FHS, you'll run into a
lot of problems when you try to install new debs that are dependent on
the old directory structure.  

jpb
-- 
Joe Block <jpb@creol.ucf.edu>
CREOL System Administrator

Social graces are the packet headers of everyday life.