Hello I have a simple solution (or two actually).
1) Document that robots.txt should be copied to the proper place in the README.Debian file. 2) Tell the user to do that in a debconf box, or even to ask for where to install it. I think it is a really bad idea to install it in /var/www. First of all this default place is probably not used, more than for very very basic installations and also because you can overwrite other things. That is my opinion anyway. I vote for telling the user and not let the package do anything (unless you parse apacheconfig and figure out where all virtual hosts is placed. :) ) Regards, // Ola On Fri, Feb 07, 2003 at 01:45:32AM -0500, sean finney wrote: > heya mentors, > > i'm packaging sugarplum, an email harvester honeypot basically. in > order to not trap legitimate web-spiders, i thought it'd be good to > make the install of a robots.txt[1] in /var/www happen by default if > possible, only i'm not sure i can/ought to really do that. > > if i made it a conffile, it would be ok if there were already a file > there (it would go through the whole diff/yes/no conffile handler), > but if the package were purged the file would be removed regardless > of whether or not the file was there originally and was used for other > stuff (which it might be). i'd feel bad about just deleting it like > that. > > i could just do nothing, but then i fear not enough people read > /usr/share/doc and we'd have a bunch of debian users making life > hell for the legitimate web crawlers out there. > > the only other thing i could think is that if there already is one, > don't touch it, and otherwise, cat a copy that exists in /usr/share > onto it, and when the package is purged, check if the file is > the same as what is in the package, and if so, delete it, but otherwise > leave it. this seems like a hack destined to leave cruft behind though. > > any suggestions or thoughts? they'd be much appreciated. > > > sean > > [1] the robots.txt, for those unfamiliar with the > never-quite-an-rfc-standard, basically can say things like "spiders, > don't go here", which spammers frequently ignore but google won't. -- --------------------- Ola Lundqvist --------------------------- / [EMAIL PROTECTED] Annebergsslingan 37 \ | [EMAIL PROTECTED] 654 65 KARLSTAD | | +46 (0)54-10 14 30 +46 (0)70-332 1551 | | http://www.opal.dhs.org UIN/icq: 4912500 | \ gpg/f.p.: 7090 A92B 18FE 7994 0C36 4FE4 18A1 B1CF 0FE5 3DD9 / ---------------------------------------------------------------
