Subject: major hier(7) overhauls?
To: None <tech-userlevel@netbsd.org>
From: Greg A. Woods <woods@most.weird.com>
List: tech-userlevel
Date: 12/20/1998 01:23:57
[ On Sat, December 19, 1998 at 16:12:03 (-0800), Objects In Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear wrote: ]
> Subject: Re: Moving /var/cron/tabs
>
> cyber@ecst.csuchico.edu sez:
> /*
>  * I'd like to second this.  There is should be no reason that a system 
>  * should not be able to just create /var dynamicly at boot type (mfs).
> 
> Able to, maybe.  As status quo, no.  /var holds too many thing like
> mail and, albeit a separate filesystem, news.

Note that he said it should be *possible*.....

> Could we please stop trying to do major overhauls on the various hier-
> archies and work with what we've got?  CSRG wasn't a bunch of particularly
> dense individuals -- they obviously came up with the current scheme for
> hier(7), with root being the obvious (and necessary) exception to the
> rule (i.e. bin, sbin, lib, libdata, libexec; root adds var, dev, etc, tmp,
> each of which has their own hierarchic structure), and they didn't do it
> on a whim.  They put some real thought into what they did.

Well, ummm, they did a lot of that definition to meet slightly different
requirements than most systems have today, and with a slightly stronger
tie to their particular view of history.

As some of you know my favourite "major overhaul" would be to eliminate
/usr and move the system entirely back into one self-consistent,
single-level, hierarchy.  We no longer need to split the system over
separate disk packs, not because of size, not because of speed, not even
because of reliability and robustness.

-- 
							Greg A. Woods

+1 416 218-0098      VE3TCP      <gwoods@acm.org>      <robohack!woods>
Planix, Inc. <woods@planix.com>; Secrets of the Weird <woods@weird.com>