Re: Gnome Paths for opt and var

[Raja R Harinath <harinath cs umn edu>]

Andreas Jellinghaus <aj@dungeon.inka.de> writes:
> my default install point is /opt/gnome.
> according to fhs, the etc dir would be /etc/opt/gnome, not /opt/gnome/etc.
> according to fhs, the var dir would be /var/opt/gnome, not /opt/gnome/var.

For the time being, pass

	--prefix=/opt/gnome \
	  --sysconfdir=/etc/opt/gnome --localstatedir=/var/opt/gnome

to `configure' (or `autogen.sh', if you must :-).  If you find this
really painful, write a small autoconf macro that figures out that
$prefix has a special value, and intuits $sysconfdir and $localstatedir
from that.

      if test $enable_fhs_compliance = "yes"; then
	case "$prefix" in
	/opt/*)
	  # try not to override an explicitly specified $sysconfdir
	  if test "$sysconfdir" = '${prefix}/etc'; then
	    sysconfdir=/etc/$prefix
	  fi
	  # try not to override an explicitly specified $localstatedir
	  if test "$localstatedir" = '${prefix}/var'; then
	    localstatedir=/var/$prefix
	  fi ;;
	esac
      fi

Put this and other stuff (like the AC_ARG_ENABLE(fhs-compliance), and
other requirements of the FHS) into a macro FHS_COMPLIANCE, put it into
the GNOME configure.in files, and otherwise distribute.  Convince the
`autoconf' maintainer to incorporate it into `autoconf'.  It may be
useful to poll packagers from Debian, RedHat, &c. to see if this is
worthwhile.

> Installing files in /var and /etc : don't overwrite old files, please.
> If somebody tuned his config file in /etc, it would be lost.
> 
> Installation should behave more like a package manager, with all that care
> about config files etc.

If you want the functionality of a package manager, it may be simpler to
use one.

- Hari
-- 
Raja R Harinath ------------------------------ harinath@cs.umn.edu
"When all else fails, read the instructions."      -- Cahn's Axiom
"Our policy is, when in doubt, do the right thing."   -- Roy L Ash