[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Christian Schwarz) wrote on 05.01.98 in <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> On Tue, 6 Jan 1998, Hamish Moffatt wrote: > > > On Mon, Jan 05, 1998 at 11:58:12PM +1100, Hamish Moffatt wrote: > > > Urgh, I hate it already. Can somebody post a rationale for > > > the section of policy quoted above? I notice that mgetty > > > has added faxrunq to my /etc/crontab on my bo system. > > The idea behind the policy is explained in `3.3.7 Configuration files'. As > /etc/crontab is a configuration file of the "cron" package, no other > package may touch it. That's because in the past, we had packages that > messed around with other packages configuration files. > > The solution presented in 3.3.7 is that the "owner" of the conffile (cron > in that case) provides a utility (like install-info, for example) through > which other packages can register and remove cron jobs. Umm. There's a good reason for not automatically modifying conffiles, ever: "... was modified by you or by a script ..." The general rule, AFAIR, is for a file to _either_ be a conffile, or _completely_ handled by scripts, and never the twain shall meet. And yes, we still have a number of (sometimes important) packages getting this wrong. In this case, it's probably best if /etc/crontab goes the "script only" route, with a section clearly reserved for the sysadmin, and other sections handled automatically. The "update-crontab" script would have to handle "ancient" /etc/crontab files that were done by conffile+sysadmin+scripts before; probably impossible without manual intervention. Also, make sure that old *rm scripts won't junk the new, improved crontab! This is not going to be fun. MfG Kai -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word "unsubscribe" to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] .
