Re: Rationale

[Paul E Condon <pecondon@peakpeak.com>]

On Mon, Dec 01, 2003 at 12:37:48PM -0700, Thanasis Kinias wrote:
> 
> Ja, if a user is competent to be building custom binaries, he or she
> should be able to add $HOME/bin to $PATH.
> 

An OS should be configured to help a user avoid shooting himself in
the foot. To this end $HOME/bin should be at the *end* of the PATH.
This way, a new user who makes truly foolish name choises for his
first few programs, is not cut off from critical parts of the OS.
On this issue, it is not good to assume that the user is competent.
"Hello, World" is a custom binary. The *next* program after Hello,World
is also a custom binary, but with serious mistakes included. 

While investigating my system recently, I noticed the following lines
in .bash_profile:

# set PATH so it includes user's private bin if it exists
#if [ -d ~/bin ] ; then
#    PATH=~/bin:"${PATH}"
#fi

These lines, if uncommented, would introduce some nasty behavior into
a standard Debian install. They have been there for a long time, but
I think they should be reconsidered by the appropriate authorities.

-- 
Paul E Condon           
pecondon@peakpeak.com