Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS) compliancy?

[Brandon Hume]

> and provide realistic performance.  And each can live in harmony with
> the rest of the OS, without "dominating the entire machine".

By "dominating", I was referring to "my news server runs my news server", not
"my news server is also my shell host".  In MY experience, in *serious*
deployments, a news machine does news, nothing else.  And the news server is
regarded as an entity that is part of but not the same as the machine it runs
on.  I consider the same to be true for a database server, and if a backwards
hick like myself might be so bold as to consider the primary campus mail hub
I built to be "serious", the same holds true for mail (except for the spool,
which is only under /var/spool/mqueue for historical reasons, all mail-related
files are stored under /local/mail...).

> Mostly Linux and *BSD at the moment.  It might take a while, but I

This is the first I've heard of this with regards to anything but Linux.

According to /usr/ports/news/inn/pkg/PLIST on my FreeBSD -CURRENT machine, 
aside from the isolated /var/spool/news directory (which is probably more for
historical positioning than anything else), all of INN gets placed under a
${PREFIX}/news directory, and I believe the PREFIX defaults to /usr/local.
This is consistent with how FreeBSD places just about everything installed
from the ports tree.

I've asked a friend who is heavily involved with OpenBSD, he tells me this is
the first he's heard of it (after explaining to him what FHS was, and after
his stated "ugh").

Which BSDs are actually doing this?

> eventually adopt the FHS.  System administrators who are used to the
> FHS will demand it.  (Witness Sun's inclusion of perl in Solaris 8.)

Sun's inclusion of Perl in Solaris 8 places Perl in /usr/perl5, with only a
couple of wrappers outside that base.

I think a better example from your side would have been the newly-bundled
Apache, which places (just) the configuration files in /etc/apache.  Of 
course, absolutely everything else goes under /usr/apache.

> Not everyone shares your definition of "core OS".  Solaris does, but
> most Linux vendors don't, as INN is included by default in most base
> distributions.

That was my point!  Its nearly impossible to define what the "core" OS is
with Linux.  Why should a mail server or web server, or graphics workstation,
have INN installed at all - much less installed in FHS-sanctioned locations?

What you hold up to support your point is not what I consider a boon, but a
failing.

> reasoning that "new users can't find anything".  This is one of the
> exact problems that led to the creation of the FHS in first place!

And I find it ironic that /etc/<a>, /usr/lib/<a>, /usr/share/<a>, etc is 
somehow considered "easier" than /usr/local/<a>/*.

> components of INN where they belong and where currently competent and
> future system administrators will look for and expect them."

I'd be careful with statements like this.  Since its already been stated by
a few people here that your proposal is NOT where they expect the components
of INN, you imply that they are not competent.  A pretty cheeky risk to take,
when at least one of those people is one of the core architects of INN itself.

> And on a practical note, I have zero sympathy for any Red Hat
> administrator who doesn't know enough to run "rpm -ql inn", for

I haven't seen anyone yet claim to be a Red Hat administrator.

Linux is more than just Red Hat.  Unix is more than just Linux.

> could be rearranged, this task could be greatly simplified.  Perhaps
> something like:

<cut>

This is extremely close to how it is already.

>     /usr/local/news/etc/innshellvars

As someone already pointed out, these are not true configuration files.  And
the rest of the files you mentioned are in the positions you want already.

> Thoughts?

My thoughts are that this whole discussion is dangerously close to "Linux does
it this way, therefore everyone should".  Which might just be me being 
excessively sensitive, since I've been in more than a couple of those arguments
lately.


-- 
Brandon Hume    - hume -> BOFH.Halifax.NS.Ca, http://WWW.BOFH.Halifax.NS.Ca/
                       -> Solaris Snob and general NOCMonkey