Re: /var vs /usr/pkg/var

[Thomas Klausner <tk%giga.or.at@localhost>]

On Sat, Jun 11, 2016 at 09:19:50AM +1200, Mark Davies wrote:
> On 11/06/16 05:56, Hauke Fath wrote:
> >On Fri, 10 Jun 2016 14:41:41 +0200, Thomas Klausner wrote:
> >>texmf creates lots of files in /var during installation.
> >>Shouldn't these live in ${PREFIX}/var?
> >
> >Is ${PREFIX}/var even a thing? How about ${VARBASE}?
> 
> TeX already puts them under VARBASE
> 
> % grep -r VARBASE ../kpathsea/
> ../kpathsea/patches/patch-aa:+TEXMFSYSVAR = @VARBASE@/lib/texmf
> ../kpathsea/DEINSTALL:          @VARBASE@/lib/texmf/ls-R \
> ../kpathsea/INSTALL:            @VARBASE@/lib/texmf \
> ../kpathsea/Makefile:SUBST_SED.texmfdir+=       -e
> 's,@VARBASE@,${VARBASE:C;///*;/;g:C;/$;;},'
> ../kpathsea/Makefile:BUILD_DEFS+=               VARBASE
> ../kpathsea/Makefile:OWN_DIRS+=         ${TEXMFLOCAL} ${VARBASE}/lib/texmf
> ../kpathsea/Makefile:OWN_DIRS_PERMS+=   ${VARBASE}/lib/texmf/fonts/${d}

After more consideration, my point is that I don't think the files
that tex generates should be somewhere else than prefix.

AFAIU, they contain caches for the installed files that live in
${PREFIX}. I heard of cases where people share ${PREFIX} across
machines -- in that case the tex files should also be shared.

But probably I'm missing something.
 Thomas