Re: Mystery: disappearing .mailfilterrc
On Thu, Oct 23, 2003 at 09:52:20PM -0700, Ross Boylan wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 24, 2003 at 01:29:09AM +0100, Pigeon wrote:
> > On Thu, Oct 23, 2003 at 12:11:18AM -0700, Ross Boylan wrote:
> > > In the last week I have twice rebooted, and each time my .mailfilterrc
> > > AND its backup in an RCS directory have disappeared. Does anyone have
> > > any ideas what could be causing this truly bizarre behavior?
> > >
> > > I know the file was there because a) I checked and b) mailfilter ran
> > > fine before the reboot.
> > >
> > > I run mailfilter from the preconnect of fetchmail. fetchmail is
> > > invoked by the /etc/ppp/ip-up.d/fetchmail script. It runs as user
> > > fetchmail.
> > >
> > > The file is in /var/run/fetchmail/.mailfilterrc with RCS in
> > > /var/run/fetchmail/RCS/. Thr RCS directory itself does survive the reboot.
> > > The files clearly survive having the ppp connection closed down and
> > > restarted (that is, once I get them in place).
> > >
> > > /var is a Reiser file system on an LVM volume in an EVMS container. I
> > > noticed no error messages on boot up, nor do I see any in the log
> > > (though the log has fewer messages than showed on the screen).
> >
> > Have you clocked this message:
> >
> > Clearing: /tmp /var/lock /var/run.
> >
> > /var/run is not a place to put things that you want to survive a
> > reboot...
>
> Aha! Thanks for the tip.
>
> I don't see that in my logs, and haven't noticed it on my screen.
> But I think I found the code in init.d/bootmisc.sh.
>
> #
> # Clean up /var/run in the same way as /var/lock,
> # and create /var/run/utmp so that we can login.
> #
> [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && echo -n "/var/run"
> ( cd /var/run && \
> find . ! -type d ! -name utmp ! -name innd.pid ! -name pump.sock \
> ! -newer /proc -exec rm -f -- {} \; )
>
> Is this behavior specified in the FHS? somewhere else?
Answering my own question: FHS 5.10 states
5.10 /var/run : Run-time variable data
This directory contains system information data describing the system
since it was booted. Files under this directory should be cleared
(removed or truncated as appropriate) at the beginning of the boot
process.
This leaves the mystery of why one file survived the reboot.
>
> I guess I better move the files.
>
> And it still seems mysterious that one of my files in /var/run
> (mailfilterlog) survived this test. I'm not sure why. If it got
> touched immediately after startup it would be safe, but I don't think
> anything would touch it (since it only runs when ppp goes up).
>
>
>
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