Re: Resolutions to comments on LSB-FHS-TS_SPEC_V1.0

[Gordon Tetlow <gordon.m.tetlow@vanderbilt.edu>]

Florian La Roche wrote:
>
> I can also see some points why /var/mail would be a better standard point
> if we would make a "new" decision about this. But Linux has a large user
> base now and after the move from /var/spool/mail to /var/mail, we would
> not have gained a lot. So why do it?
> 
> There are reasons why all distributions stayed with /var/spool/mail.
> Even Debian who also thinks a lot about making things sane/clean has
> stayed with /var/spool/mail.
> 
> This standardization project should be documenting the current state
> and the current movement. This will bring the Linux distributions
> together and manifest the (global) movement to a standard Linux system.
> I don't see any reason this project should dictate completely new
> things to the different Linux distributions. They already do their best
> to improve it.

I thought the purpose of this project (at least the FHS) is to create a standard
of what the filesystem should look like, not necessarily what it currently looks
like. Just because `Everyone is doing it' (tm) doesn't mean it's right.
Personally, I want Linux to be clean and elegant in its implementation, so if
that means breaking from convention and putting mail in /var/mail, so be it. I
for one don't know the answer. Whatever the answer is should be the right one,
not just the one people are doing.

Gordon Tetlow