Subject: Re: Cosmetic changes to rc.d scripts
To: Julio M. Merino Vidal <jmmv@menta.net>
From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?C=E9sar_Catri=E1n?= C. <ccatrian@eml.cc>
List: tech-userlevel
Date: 10/13/2004 12:08:12
On Tue, 12 Oct 2004 21:30:36 +0200
"Julio M. Merino Vidal" <jmmv@menta.net> wrote:

> Hi all,
>=20
> I've been doing some cosmetic changes to the rc.d scripts, based on what =
I've
> seen lately on multiple Linux distributions.

commercial investigation

> The first one is the addition of a "comment" variable; this holds a string
> describing the purpose of the service handled by the rc.d script.
> This comment is used in start/stop messages instead of the daemon name.
> I think this is useful because you can see what's going on more easily;
> specially, it will make novice's life easier (less criptic stuff).

I think that it is a eyecandy and useless feature. That characteristic will=
 not help to you nor no person of this list. And perhaps you are committing=
 an error. You are not speaking by you. did a novice ask for that character=
istic to you? if he did not do it, is a unsolicited characteristic. And the=
 good novice wants to learn wtf is inetd to reach the level of knowledge of=
 the others and to be able to contribute. What novice class you prefer? you=
 love novices who depend on you, satisfied just by the meaning with "Intern=
et superserver", or novices whom they love to learn?

I do not like the idea to maintain the new users in ignorance of which real=
ly it happens. If you really want that the novices to learn, one can reduce=
 the code instead of the messages; keep it simple .

That type of characteristics will fail sooner or later, and will require ma=
ntainership and updates. Some PR perhaps. Time and work that must be dedica=
ted to other done characteristics to maintain the system working well.

Nevertheless, I think that it is a good commercial strategy. Can a system b=
e chosen and be bought only by its initial messages? it can be.

I think that feature is a good candidate to $ echo "EYECANDY_COMMERCIAL?=3D=
" >> /etc/rc.conf . I am serious about it.

That is what I think about it.

C=E9sar Catri=E1n C.