On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 12:00:35PM +0100, Fabio Rossi wrote: > On Wednesday 31 December 2008, Marius Mauch wrote: > > > The same could be said about /var/lib/init.d, /var/lib/dhcp, > > /var/lib/iptables or several other packages that aren't hosted by > > Gentoo. In the other direction, if the packages are eventually used on > > other distributions/systems, should they then use another path? > > The path could be configured of course but, again, I see a few chances of > having this tools outside gentoo, the proposal is based also on this idea. > > > Mind that this only addresses the FHS part of my mail, you haven't > > really answered my question: What's the benefit of changing things? > > Change for the sake of change is rarely a good idea (unless you work in > > PR/marketing ;) > > The main benefit is a cleaner filesystem, I don't know your opinion but I > hate > to see sparse files around the tree and waste time in discovering their > source :-) Moreover IMHO it gives me the impression of a better design.
I'm the first to admit I'm an organization/directory junkie, but have learned that 'cleaner' is certainly in the eye of the beholder. What I see as disorganized chaos a flat-filer sees as visibility heaven. This has nothing to do with good design (although you would and I used to argue that) and everything to do with personal taste. It could even be argued that the proposal is poor design, forcing Gentoo-specific programs to follow non-standards, discouraging them from ever integrating seamlessly with anything non-Gentoo. This is Gentoo's living room and it generally lives there alone. Don't force it into a small corner for no reason. --dc
