Gentoo Archives: gentoo-user

From: Mick <michaelkintzios@×××××.com>
To: gentoo-user@l.g.o
Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] Cleaning redundant configuration files
Date: Tue, 31 May 2011 20:30:52
Message-Id: 201105312129.42698.michaelkintzios@gmail.com
In Reply to: Re: [gentoo-user] Cleaning redundant configuration files by David W Noon
1 On Tuesday 31 May 2011 17:26:43 David W Noon wrote:
2 > On Tue, 31 May 2011 10:10:01 +0200, Neil Bothwick wrote about Re:
3 >
4 > [gentoo-user] Cleaning redundant configuration files:
5 > >On Mon, 30 May 2011 23:08:08 +0100, David W Noon wrote:
6 > >> You have just touched on an annoyance of unmerge, in that it does not
7 > >> clean up configuration files that have been modified. It removes
8 > >> files that are still in the same state as when the package was
9 > >> emerged, but not those modified by the user. I don't see how user
10 > >> changes make the file more important than would be in its vanilla
11 > >> state.
12 > >
13 > >It doesn't remove *any* files that have been modified,
14 >
15 > Erm ... that's what I wrote, above. [That is, of course, predicated on
16 > the assumption that installing Package A will not modify configuration
17 > files owned by Package B, and vice-versa: all post-installation
18 > modifications are performed by the user.]
19 >
20 > >the reasons
21 > >systems used to get cluttered with orphaned .la files. The logic is
22 > >quite simple, if it is not the file portage installed with the
23 > >package, it should not be uninstalled with the package.
24 >
25 > Why should that be so? If the user has modified a configuration file
26 > after the previous installation and then unmerges the package, a repeat
27 > of the configuration changes is all that is required to reinstate it if
28 > the package is removed in its entirety. The user might even be daring
29 > and take a backup of the file(s) in question.
30
31 It seems that we have a different appreciation of the user's value of time in
32 editing config files ...
33
34
35 > To repeat myself: I do not see a customized configuration file as being
36 > any more important than a vanilla one. If I understand a configuration
37 > file well enough to customize it once, I remain capable of customizing
38 > it again after a reinstall.
39
40 I would *not* want to have to reconfigure sendmail, apache, mrtg, or umpteen
41 other files from scratch if you don't mind. I probably can't remember what I
42 was doing 3 years ago (or whenever I might have edited them) and the whole
43 ecosystem of keeping things going may be quite fragile to cope with portage
44 doing away with files I had modified, *without* asking me!
45
46 Yes, I know there are back ups and rsync can be ran so as to not delete old
47 config file back ups, but I find the current set up most convenient and
48 sensible. After all we're talking about a few extra KB for a small number of
49 config files, hardly a space saver these days.
50
51 However, if we're talking of an additional option for those who want to use it
52 to remove orphan config files, but which offers enough warnings to wake up the
53 user, then I wouldn't of course object to that as long as it was not made the
54 default setting. Personally, unless there is mass demand for such a feature,
55 I think that qfile -o is good enough for this purpose.
56
57 Anyway, just my 2c's.
58 --
59 Regards,
60 Mick

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