1 |
Fellow Council Members: |
2 |
|
3 |
We now have two methods of handling separate /usr configurations on |
4 |
Linux in the tree. |
5 |
|
6 |
The first, and by far, the most flexable method is to use an initramfs. |
7 |
This method is now documented in the initramfs guide [1] and the handbooks. |
8 |
It would need to be used if a user needs specialized drivers running or |
9 |
modules loaded before the / or /usr file systems can be accessed. |
10 |
A non-inclusive list of these situations would be RAID, LVM2, ZFS, and |
11 |
software for encrypted file systems. |
12 |
|
13 |
The second method can be used if the flexability of the first method is |
14 |
not needed. It involves re-emerging >=sys-apps/busybox-1.20.0 with the |
15 |
sep-usr use flag active and following the instructions in the elog |
16 |
messages. This is the way to support separate /usr without an initramfs |
17 |
if someone wants this. |
18 |
|
19 |
The goal of separate /usr support is to insure that /usr is always |
20 |
available when / is, and both of these methods meet this goal. If users |
21 |
switch to one of these methods, there is no further work required by us |
22 |
to support separate /usr configurations. |
23 |
|
24 |
I have gone over this with Diego in QA, and he agrees that these are the |
25 |
methods we should use. That is why he is on the cc: specifically for |
26 |
this email. |
27 |
|
28 |
I believe the only remaining step is for the council to approve this |
29 |
plan, so I would like it to be added to the agenda. |
30 |
|
31 |
If this is approved, my plan will be to release a news item then |
32 |
give a time window for users to read the news item and make their |
33 |
decision [2]. Once the time window expires, we could assume that users |
34 |
with separate /usr have switched to using one of these two methods of |
35 |
supporting it. |
36 |
|
37 |
Thanks, |
38 |
|
39 |
William |
40 |
|
41 |
[1] http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/initramfs-guide.xml |
42 |
|
43 |
[2] I'm thinking a reasonable time window would be 30 days. That could |
44 |
be up for discussion; however, I don't know of any reasons that we |
45 |
should wait too much longer. |