Re: Rationale
scripsit Paul E Condon:
> 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.
It should not castrate me, however, in an attempt to keep me out of
trouble. So long as it is possible for me to set my own $PATH, it's not
really an issue, but _forcing_ me to put my own bin dirs at the end of
the path is impolite. On the various non-Linux machines where I have
only a user account, for example, I rely on being able to put GNU tar
and coreutils in $HOME/bin and have them execute instead of the
Solaris/IRIX/AIX/whatever versions.
> On this issue, it is not good to assume that the user is competent.
I prefer my OS not to make assumptions about my incompetence, thank you.
That's one reason I use Debian, after all.
--
Pax vobiscum; pax cum omnibus.
Thanasis Kinias
tkinias at asu.edu
Doctoral Student, Department of History
Arizona State University
Tempe, Arizona, U.S.A.
Reply to: