Re: [gentoo-dev] rfc: converting /etc/mtab to a symlink

[David Leverton]

Rich Freeman wrote:
> However, FWIW, linux namespaces cannot be used to have only a single
> file appear differently to different processes.  Mount namespaces can
> only operate at the directory level.

So to work around that limitation we insist that everyone change how 
their systems are set up, and still have to reintroduce mtab under a 
different name ("utab", hidden away under /run) because 
/proc/self/mounts *doesn't* contain everything that's supposed to be in 
mtab after all?

If someone decides they want to use, say, different DNS servers in 
different namespaces, should we make the kernel store the server IP 
addresses, add a /proc file that dumps them out in the expected format, 
and demand that everyone replace their /etc/resolv.conf with a symlink 
to /proc/self/resolv.conf?  Or maybe, if people want namespaces, they 
can implement them properly, in which case it becomes literally a 
self-solving problem.