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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.uwa.edu.au!classic.iinet.com.au!news.uoregon.edu!newsfeed.internetmci.com!news.msfc.nasa.gov!pendragon.jsc.nasa.gov!ames!cnn.nas.nasa.gov!lestat.nas.nasa.gov!thorpej From: thorpej@lestat.nas.nasa.gov (Jason R. Thorpe) Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc Subject: Re: File hierarchy (was Re: Linux or FreeBSD) Date: 17 Sep 1995 19:14:15 GMT Organization: Numerical Aerodynamic Simulation Project - NASA Ames Lines: 31 Message-ID: <43hs27$8oc@cnn.nas.nasa.gov> References: <409iah$inf@galaxy.ucr.edu> <x77n3v6j1t.fsf@blindman.lm.com> <43diee$djf@post.gsfc.nasa.gov> <43h7mv$c0@lugnut.stu.rpi.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: lestat.nas.nasa.gov In article <43h7mv$c0@lugnut.stu.rpi.edu>, Damien Neil <damien@lugnut.stu.rpi.edu> wrote: >This reminds me of something I've been meaning to ask. Is there any >document giving a rationale for FreeBSD's file layout? I've become >completely confused as to what criteria have been used to distribute >files between (/usr)/bin and (/usr)/sbin. Under some systems, /sbin >has been a location for statically linked binaries. This is not the >case with FreeBSD: all binaries on the root partition are statically >linked by necessity, and none of the ones in /usr/sbin are. Under the >Linux FSSTND, /sbin and /usr/sbin are to contain binaries that only the >superuser would ever want to execute. That doesn't seem to describe >the situation with FreeBSD either, though; ping in is /sbin, nslookup >is in /usr/sbin, and both are often used by users. % man hier The one that comes with NetBSD, anyhow, is basically right from 4.4BSD-Lite. It sort of needs to be updated for the slight differences in NetBSD (and presumably FreeBSD), but pretty much applies. The one thing that's typically bothered me about the Linux filesystem layout standard is that it's too specific (at least the last one I saw). What makes more sense if a document outlining what you get when you put `/bin:/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin' in your path, etc. -- Jason R. Thorpe thorpej@nas.nasa.gov NASA Ames Research Center Home: 408.866.1912 NAS: M/S 258-6 Work: 415.604.0935 Moffett Field, CA 94035 Pager: 415.428.6939