"Steven M. Bellovin" wrote:
> 
> In message <20030605235926.GF7074@goldberry.poofy.goof.com>, "Aaron J. Grier" w
> rites:
> >On Thu, Jun 05, 2003 at 12:05:53PM -0700, Greywolf wrote:
> >
> >> It's up to the individual, of course, and I can see where / and /usr
> >> make a good merge now (but don't enforce it, please, by doing
> >> something stupid like making dependencies on /usr being mounted in
> >> single-user mode!),
> >...
> >how far can things be split out?
> >
> >what is the minimum partition required for single user mode?
> >...
> >
> >besides /bin, /sbin, and /dev, what else is necessary on the root
> >partition for single user mode?
> >
> 
> Probably /etc, for /etc/rc* to get out of single-user mode cleanly.
> 
Funny thing, I was just annoyed the other day about a /usr dependency 
in single user mode.  You see, I'd not su'd on that particular machine 
in over 4 months, and couldn't remember the root password.  (All my 
machines have different passwords for every account, don't yours?  And 
of course, I wouldn't write them down, would you?)  

passwd is in /usr/bin.  Not even /usr/sbin -- where I'd have guessed 
"security" binaries might be stored!

In single user mode, without /usr mounted, it took a long time to find.

IMHO, passwd really should be in /sbin.  And chmod, more & less, and 
other really basic file commands, should be in /bin. 

The reason I hadn't used the root password on that particular machine 
is: NetBSD won't let me SSH to root....  Oh, I already did that rant 6 
months ago when I came back to NetBSD after a long hiatus....
-- 
William Allen Simpson
    Key fingerprint =  17 40 5E 67 15 6F 31 26  DD 0D B9 9B 6A 15 2C 32