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Xref: sserve comp.infosystems.www.browsers.x:635 comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:2670 Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!msunews!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!cam.news.pipex.net!pipex!soap.news.pipex.net!pipex!edi.news.pipex.net!pipex!sunic!sunic.sunet.se!news.funet.fi!nntp.hut.fi!usenet From: Jarkko.Hietaniemi@hut.fi (Jarkko Hietaniemi) Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.www.browsers.x,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc Subject: Re: Netscape - this is ridiculous Date: 24 Jun 1995 21:44:48 +0300 Organization: Helsinki University of Technology, Finland Lines: 30 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <oee68lvo927.fsf@beta.hut.fi> References: <holm.803813959@carme> <3sbrfbINN1d6@boa.cis.ohio-state.edu> <DAMyzB.C0K@nntpa.cb.att.com> <3sf729INN90g@boa.cis.ohio-state.edu> <DAorxK.FwF@nntpa.cb.att.com> Reply-To: Jarkko.Hietaniemi@hut.fi NNTP-Posting-Host: beta.hut.fi Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit In-reply-to: rmb@hercules.cb.att.com's message of Sat, 24 Jun 1995 16:46:32 GMT X-Newsreader: (ding) Gnus v0.78 >>The problem is, what if the administrator wants to move the global >>mime.types and mailcap files? Then what? > > man ln. let me guess, everyone else here is a PC user, > and Rich is even posting from AT&T, the home of UNIX :( "ln" as in hard links? Nah, our users are spread on three separate filesystems, no can do. "ln" as in soft links? Nah, the whole point is that the system admin can change the global configuration if need be (for example, for us, /usr/local does not exist. Period.) without the users (11000 of those in our site) being bothered at all. If the user's preferences would be a symlink to the root-owned global preferences, the user would be might surprised and confused if he tried to edit the file. You might say: "why can't he a rm and a cp" and then edit the file. Remember, the point was that the user should not have to do anything. Having each user have a copy of the preferences file is madness, most of them will not even modify it in any way, they just waste disk space. But if some global configuration change needs to be done the administration has no other way than to edit all those copies. I don't understand the quip about PC users at all. Very little administrators and each of the thousands of users using that PC having separate copies, I would say. The idiocy of Netscape not having a global preferences file has not a single good excuse. ++jhi;