Re: FHS?

divya@xxxxxxxxxx writes:

> INN is extremely useful software - but its not something that needs to
> exist on EVERY host. Its by no means an integral part of the OS.  It
> SHOULD live inside /usr/inn-2.2.1 or whatever.

This is a case where you can have your cake and eat it too.

There are three different ways in which people prefer to install INN.  The
first is the traditional way of giving it its own prefix and its own
hierarchy; that's all that's currently supported.  Another would be to
install under FHS-style paths under /usr/local (using /usr/local/bin,
/usr/local/lib, /usr/local/libexec, /usr/local/share, and the like
correctly).  A third is to install under FHS-style paths like part of the
operating system.

The third is only necessary for distributors and packagers, so I'm
somewhat less worried about supporting it in the default build.  I'm quite
willing to add support if it makes life easier for the packagers, but as a
general rule of thumb, no one other than an operating system packager
should be installing things into /etc, /usr/bin, etc.

However, the second is absolutely useful, and I would like to support it
(and supporting the second gives us the third for almost free if anyone
cares about it).

> Software Management is the single biggest reason that I prefer Solaris
> over Linux (actually, its probably the only reason, really).
> Unfortunately, Linux has a far more complete set of device drivers than
> Solaris (x86 or Sparc).

Two weeks after I started using Debian, I never wanted to touch Solaris
again, but that's just me.  :)

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra@xxxxxxxxxxxx)             <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

    Please send questions to the list rather than mailing me directly.
     <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/faqs/questions.html> explains why.