On Fri, Jan 21, 2005 at 12:09:42PM +0800, Dan Jacobson wrote: > Now that maintainers realized that one might like a package installed, > but perhaps only plans to use it unoften, it only makes sense for not > starting at boot to be offered as a friendly configuration option, > instead of needing some devious guerilla techniques to thwart the > packages starting.
For packages I maintain that provide system services, I use another solution than making it a configuration option. The packages are split into a package providing the programs, and a -run package providing the service. Users that don't want the service to be enabled by default simply don't install the -run package. This additionally has an advantage concerning virtual packages representing a system service, such as ftp-server, mail-transport-agent, system-log-daemon, or imap-server. Here's the rationale from the bincimap-run package: $ sed -ne '18~1p' </usr/share/doc/bincimap-run/README.Debian The bincimap-run package provides the virtual package ``imap-server'' and conflicts with other packages providing ``imap-server''. This ensures that bincimap is the only service that listens on the address 0.0.0.0:993 on a system, and also satisfies packages that depend on a running imap service. The bincimap package without the bincimap-run package can be installed alongside other imap-server packages on a system, e.g. to provide different imap or imaps services on different addresses simultaneously. -- Gerrit Pape <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Fri, 17 Oct 2003 07:45:52 +0000 $ Regards, Gerrit. -- Open projects at http://smarden.org/pape/. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
