Re: [gentoo-dev] [PATCH] use.desc: add global USE flag 'split-sbin'

[Jaco Kroon <jaco@uls.co.za>]

Hi,

On 2019/10/15 19:34, David Seifert wrote:
> On Tue, 2019-10-15 at 12:04 -0400, Mike Gilbert wrote:
>> On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 12:02 PM Mike Gilbert <floppym@gentoo.org>
>> wrote:
>>> On Tue, Oct 15, 2019 at 8:00 AM David Seifert <soap@gentoo.org>
>>> wrote:
>>>> On Sun, 2019-10-13 at 12:33 -0400, Mike Gilbert wrote:
>>>>> On Sat, Oct 12, 2019 at 1:52 PM David Seifert <soap@gentoo.org>
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>> On Sat, 2019-10-12 at 19:01 +0200, Dennis Schridde wrote:
>>>>>>> On Samstag, 12. Oktober 2019 18:02:28 CEST William Hubbs
>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>> On Sat, Oct 12, 2019 at 01:11:49PM +0200, Michał Górny
>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>> On Sat, 2019-10-12 at 13:00 +0200, David Seifert wrote:
>>>>>>>>>> * Some distros have not just merged / and /usr, they
>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>   have also merged /usr/bin and /usr/sbin. By giving
>>>>>>>>>>   users the choice of merging */bin and */sbin,
>>>>>>>>>>   Gentoo follows suit.
>>>>>>>>> What about the scenario when /bin has been merged with
>>>>>>>>> /usr/sbin
>>>>>>>>> and /sbin with /usr/bin?  ;-P
>>>>>>>> I also don't see the need for something like this. The
>>>>>>>> idea of
>>>>>>>> the
>>>>>>>> /usr
>>>>>>>> merge is to have all binaries available in one place, and
>>>>>>>> there
>>>>>>>> really
>>>>>>>> is not a good justification for separating bin from sbin.
>>>>>>> Do I read this correctly?  USE=-split-usr currently means
>>>>>>> that
>>>>>>> /bin,
>>>>>>> /sbin, /
>>>>>>> usr/bin and /usr/sbin point to the same directory?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> If that is not the case, then I agree that users should
>>>>>>> have the
>>>>>>> possibility
>>>>>>> to set it up like this and USE=-split-sbin should be
>>>>>>> supported.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> --Dennis
>>>>>> I agree, I wasn't aware that USE=-split-usr implies the
>>>>>> complete 2-
>>>>>> level (/usr and *sbin) merge. In that case, all of this is
>>>>>> obsolete.
>>>>> That was NOT my intention when I introduced the split-usr USE
>>>>> flag.
>>>>>
>>>>> For bin/sbin, I would prefer to drop any conflicting links
>>>>> unconditionally. Do you have examples of scenarios where this
>>>>> is not
>>>>> possible?
>>>>>
>>>> William has confirmed on IRC that USE=-split-usr performs the
>>>> complete
>>>> Fedora-esque /usr merge (which makes sense IMO).
>>> William's opinion is not the only one that matters.
>> Sorry, I guess you are referring to the behavior baselayout? That
>> doesn't necessarily align with the global usage.
>>
> https://gitweb.gentoo.org/proj/baselayout.git/tree/Makefile#n93
>
> Clearly the usr-merge in baselayout intends to merge all these 4
> directories. There is currently no option to merge /usr and / but keep
> /bin and /sbin separate, so the most parsimonious solution here is to
> assume that usr-merge semantics in Gentoo is about merging all 4
> directories.
>
>
For what it's worth.  All of my systems are installed with a fixed-size
512MB / with everything else (including /usr) on separate LVs.

Whilst sbin vs bin is just a matter of what's available, to me it makes
sense to keep these split.  To me it's always been logical to keep
administrative type (root) tools under sbin, and stuff that's generally
useful for users under bin.

Keeping / and /usr split (or the ability to keep it split) is rather
crucial for me.  It's for historic installations a matter of space
constraints on /.  For new installations it's a matter of keeping / as
small as possible in order to have a smallish bootable system which can
be used for recovering the rest of the system, ideally without an initrd
(which also works to an extent).

Kind Regards,
Jaco