* [TUHS] history of sbin?
@ 2013-02-01 0:06 Jeremy C. Reed
2013-02-01 1:28 ` Random832
` (2 more replies)
0 siblings, 3 replies; 13+ messages in thread
From: Jeremy C. Reed @ 2013-02-01 0:06 UTC (permalink / raw)
I have heard the story a few times about sbin split is due to disk
space, such as told at
http://www.osnews.com/story/25556/Understanding_the_bin_sbin_usr_bin_usr_sbin_Split/
http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/busybox/2010-December/074114.html
But I don't see any mention of it in 32V and not in BSD until around
Net2 (like in 1991 src.README said ``... there has been a major
reorganization of the file system. (You may have seen similar
reorganizations on systems shipped by Sun Microsytems [sic] and Digital
Equipment Corporation, among others.) ... /sbin same as /bin, but
binaries for the root user''. The slides from Feb. 1988 for a BSD BOF at
USENIX mentioned this sbin reorganization.
Looking at "Unix Text Processing" (1987) and "Life with Unix" (1989) I
didn't see any use of sbin/. (I didn't look at my other old books.)
From searching old 1980 usenet archives I only saw a few mentions (like
/usr/brl/sbin/...).
When did some (non-BSD) systems ship and document /sbin, /usr/sbin?
Is the common story (liked linked above) the right story?
Jeremy C. Reed
echo uggc://errqzrqvn.arg/obbxf/ofq-uvfgbel/ | \
tr "noqruvxzabcefgl" "abdehikmnoprsty"
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 0:06 [TUHS] history of sbin? Jeremy C. Reed @ 2013-02-01 1:28 ` Random832 2013-02-01 1:37 ` Warner Losh 2013-02-01 1:41 ` Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:03 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper, was " Warren Toomey 2 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread From: Random832 @ 2013-02-01 1:28 UTC (permalink / raw) On 1/31/2013 7:06 PM, Jeremy C. Reed wrote: > I have heard the story a few times about sbin split is due to disk > space, such as told at > http://www.osnews.com/story/25556/Understanding_the_bin_sbin_usr_bin_usr_sbin_Split/ > http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/busybox/2010-December/074114.html > Well, keeping in mind the stuff in /sbin used to be in /etc, in e.g. v7 - it's possible the real reason is simply they wanted binaries out of /etc and didn't want to put them in /bin where normal users might wonder "what is this?". ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 1:28 ` Random832 @ 2013-02-01 1:37 ` Warner Losh 0 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Warner Losh @ 2013-02-01 1:37 UTC (permalink / raw) On Jan 31, 2013, at 6:28 PM, Random832 wrote: > On 1/31/2013 7:06 PM, Jeremy C. Reed wrote: >> I have heard the story a few times about sbin split is due to disk >> space, such as told at >> http://www.osnews.com/story/25556/Understanding_the_bin_sbin_usr_bin_usr_sbin_Split/ >> http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/busybox/2010-December/074114.html >> > Well, keeping in mind the stuff in /sbin used to be in /etc, in e.g. v7 - it's possible the real reason is simply they wanted binaries out of /etc and didn't want to put them in /bin where normal users might wonder "what is this?". The split was for /usr and slash. Those things in / were local on small disks needed to boot the system just enough to mount a shared /usr remotely or to do some very limited recovery. This is why there's both /usr/bin and /bin. It doesn't explain the /sbin and /bin split though. I recall from SunOS 3.x documentation that I no longer have access to that the split was done to improve exec times for normal users. They didn't want the hash list to get too long with all the extra stuff in /sbin and /usr/sbin. the movement of the files from /etc also included movement to /libexec or /usr/libexec for many of the daemons that started out life in /etc. things like ifconfig moved to /sbin where people could more easily run them. Maybe the original /etc and /bin split was for PATH reasons? Warner ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 0:06 [TUHS] history of sbin? Jeremy C. Reed 2013-02-01 1:28 ` Random832 @ 2013-02-01 1:41 ` Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 1:53 ` ramble1035 @dslextreme.com 2013-02-01 2:03 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper, was " Warren Toomey 2 siblings, 1 reply; 13+ messages in thread From: Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 1:41 UTC (permalink / raw) On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 06:06:15PM -0600, Jeremy C. Reed wrote: > http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/busybox/2010-December/074114.html A few inaccuracies: When the operating system grew too big to fit on the first RK05 disk pack (their root filesystem) they let it leak into the second one, which is where all the user home directories lived (which is why the mount was called /usr). They replicated all the OS directories under there (/bin, /sbin, /lib, /tmp...) and wrote files to those new directories because their original disk was out of space. When they got a third disk, they mounted it on /home and relocated all the user directories to there so the OS could consume all the space on both disks and grow to THREE WHOLE MEGABYTES (ooooh!). Research Unix never had /sbin nor /home, and the tale of the third disk doesn't ring any bells to me. 7th Edition has /usr/dmr and /usr/ken, not /home/dmr nor /usr/home/dmr :) Cheers, Warren ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 1:41 ` Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 1:53 ` ramble1035 @dslextreme.com 2013-02-01 2:01 ` Larry McVoy 2013-02-01 2:02 ` Armando Stettner 0 siblings, 2 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: ramble1035 @dslextreme.com @ 2013-02-01 1:53 UTC (permalink / raw) Based on some vague recollections of early days at Sun... I seem to recall that one of the main differences between /bin and /sbin was that the /sbin binaries were all built with static libraries rather than shared. I heard /sbin described as "single-user bin"... I don't know when /sbin first appeared, though. -- Chris On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 5:41 PM, Warren Toomey <wkt at tuhs.org> wrote: > On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 06:06:15PM -0600, Jeremy C. Reed wrote: > > http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/busybox/2010-December/074114.html > > A few inaccuracies: > > When the operating system grew too big to fit on the first RK05 disk > pack (their root filesystem) they let it leak into the second one, > which is where all the user home directories lived (which is why > the mount was called /usr). They replicated all the OS directories > under there (/bin, /sbin, /lib, /tmp...) and wrote files to those > new directories because their original disk was out of space. > When they got a third disk, they mounted it on /home and relocated > all the user directories to there so the OS could consume all the > space on both disks and grow to THREE WHOLE MEGABYTES (ooooh!). > > Research Unix never had /sbin nor /home, and the tale of the third disk > doesn't ring any bells to me. > > 7th Edition has /usr/dmr and /usr/ken, not /home/dmr nor /usr/home/dmr :) > > Cheers, > Warren > _______________________________________________ > TUHS mailing list > TUHS at minnie.tuhs.org > https://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/attachments/20130131/efb314c4/attachment.html> ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 1:53 ` ramble1035 @dslextreme.com @ 2013-02-01 2:01 ` Larry McVoy 2013-02-01 2:02 ` Armando Stettner 1 sibling, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Larry McVoy @ 2013-02-01 2:01 UTC (permalink / raw) Exactly. /sbin on sun was all the statically linked stuff that you could count on when in single user mode trying to unscramble the mess that was your disk. fsdb et al. On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 05:53:16PM -0800, ramble1035 @dslextreme.com wrote: > Based on some vague recollections of early days at Sun... I seem to recall > that one of the main differences between /bin and /sbin was that the /sbin > binaries were all built with static libraries rather than shared. I heard > /sbin described as "single-user bin"... > > I don't know when /sbin first appeared, though. > > -- Chris > > > On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 5:41 PM, Warren Toomey <wkt at tuhs.org> wrote: > > > On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 06:06:15PM -0600, Jeremy C. Reed wrote: > > > http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/busybox/2010-December/074114.html > > > > A few inaccuracies: > > > > When the operating system grew too big to fit on the first RK05 disk > > pack (their root filesystem) they let it leak into the second one, > > which is where all the user home directories lived (which is why > > the mount was called /usr). They replicated all the OS directories > > under there (/bin, /sbin, /lib, /tmp...) and wrote files to those > > new directories because their original disk was out of space. > > When they got a third disk, they mounted it on /home and relocated > > all the user directories to there so the OS could consume all the > > space on both disks and grow to THREE WHOLE MEGABYTES (ooooh!). > > > > Research Unix never had /sbin nor /home, and the tale of the third disk > > doesn't ring any bells to me. > > > > 7th Edition has /usr/dmr and /usr/ken, not /home/dmr nor /usr/home/dmr :) > > > > Cheers, > > Warren > > _______________________________________________ > > TUHS mailing list > > TUHS at minnie.tuhs.org > > https://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs > > > _______________________________________________ > TUHS mailing list > TUHS at minnie.tuhs.org > https://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs -- --- Larry McVoy lm at bitmover.com http://www.bitkeeper.com ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 1:53 ` ramble1035 @dslextreme.com 2013-02-01 2:01 ` Larry McVoy @ 2013-02-01 2:02 ` Armando Stettner 2013-02-01 3:09 ` Larry McVoy 2013-02-01 3:24 ` Armando Stettner 1 sibling, 2 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Armando Stettner @ 2013-02-01 2:02 UTC (permalink / raw) This all reminds me of UNIX-gurus on Usenet.... :) decvax!aps Begin forwarded message: > From: "ramble1035 @dslextreme.com" <ramble1035 at dslextreme.com> > Subject: Re: [TUHS] history of sbin? > Date: January 31, 2013 8:53:16 PM EST > To: tuhs at tuhs.org > > Based on some vague recollections of early days at Sun... I seem to recall that one of the main differences between /bin and /sbin was that the /sbin binaries were all built with static libraries rather than shared. I heard /sbin described as "single-user bin"... > > I don't know when /sbin first appeared, though. > > -- Chris > > > On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 5:41 PM, Warren Toomey <wkt at tuhs.org> wrote: > On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 06:06:15PM -0600, Jeremy C. Reed wrote: > > http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/busybox/2010-December/074114.html > > A few inaccuracies: > > When the operating system grew too big to fit on the first RK05 disk > pack (their root filesystem) they let it leak into the second one, > which is where all the user home directories lived (which is why > the mount was called /usr). They replicated all the OS directories > under there (/bin, /sbin, /lib, /tmp...) and wrote files to those > new directories because their original disk was out of space. > When they got a third disk, they mounted it on /home and relocated > all the user directories to there so the OS could consume all the > space on both disks and grow to THREE WHOLE MEGABYTES (ooooh!). > > Research Unix never had /sbin nor /home, and the tale of the third disk > doesn't ring any bells to me. > > 7th Edition has /usr/dmr and /usr/ken, not /home/dmr nor /usr/home/dmr :) > > Cheers, > Warren > _______________________________________________ > TUHS mailing list > TUHS at minnie.tuhs.org > https://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs > > _______________________________________________ > TUHS mailing list > TUHS at minnie.tuhs.org > https://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/attachments/20130131/6714cde0/attachment.html> ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 2:02 ` Armando Stettner @ 2013-02-01 3:09 ` Larry McVoy 2013-02-01 3:24 ` Armando Stettner 1 sibling, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Larry McVoy @ 2013-02-01 3:09 UTC (permalink / raw) On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 09:02:06PM -0500, Armando Stettner wrote: > This all reminds me of UNIX-gurus on Usenet.... :) > > decvax!aps ...!uwvax!lm Though it took me a while, for a long time I was ...!uwvax!geowhiz!lm Which was OK. -- --- Larry McVoy lm at bitmover.com http://www.bitkeeper.com ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 2:02 ` Armando Stettner 2013-02-01 3:09 ` Larry McVoy @ 2013-02-01 3:24 ` Armando Stettner 1 sibling, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Armando Stettner @ 2013-02-01 3:24 UTC (permalink / raw) I stand corrected: UNIX-wizards.... Thanks, Ron. :) Begin forwarded message: > From: Armando Stettner <aps at ieee.org> > Subject: Re: [TUHS] history of sbin? > Date: January 31, 2013 9:02:06 PM EST > To: "ramble1035 @dslextreme.com" <ramble1035 at dslextreme.com> > Cc: tuhs at tuhs.org > > This all reminds me of UNIX-gurus on Usenet.... :) > > decvax!aps > > > Begin forwarded message: > >> From: "ramble1035 @dslextreme.com" <ramble1035 at dslextreme.com> >> Subject: Re: [TUHS] history of sbin? >> Date: January 31, 2013 8:53:16 PM EST >> To: tuhs at tuhs.org >> >> Based on some vague recollections of early days at Sun... I seem to recall that one of the main differences between /bin and /sbin was that the /sbin binaries were all built with static libraries rather than shared. I heard /sbin described as "single-user bin"... >> >> I don't know when /sbin first appeared, though. >> >> -- Chris >> >> >> On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 5:41 PM, Warren Toomey <wkt at tuhs.org> wrote: >> On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 06:06:15PM -0600, Jeremy C. Reed wrote: >> > http://lists.busybox.net/pipermail/busybox/2010-December/074114.html >> >> A few inaccuracies: >> >> When the operating system grew too big to fit on the first RK05 disk >> pack (their root filesystem) they let it leak into the second one, >> which is where all the user home directories lived (which is why >> the mount was called /usr). They replicated all the OS directories >> under there (/bin, /sbin, /lib, /tmp...) and wrote files to those >> new directories because their original disk was out of space. >> When they got a third disk, they mounted it on /home and relocated >> all the user directories to there so the OS could consume all the >> space on both disks and grow to THREE WHOLE MEGABYTES (ooooh!). >> >> Research Unix never had /sbin nor /home, and the tale of the third disk >> doesn't ring any bells to me. >> >> 7th Edition has /usr/dmr and /usr/ken, not /home/dmr nor /usr/home/dmr :) >> >> Cheers, >> Warren >> _______________________________________________ >> TUHS mailing list >> TUHS at minnie.tuhs.org >> https://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs >> >> _______________________________________________ >> TUHS mailing list >> TUHS at minnie.tuhs.org >> https://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs > _______________________________________________ > TUHS mailing list > TUHS at minnie.tuhs.org > https://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/attachments/20130131/0aed610f/attachment.html> ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper, was Re: history of sbin? 2013-02-01 0:06 [TUHS] history of sbin? Jeremy C. Reed 2013-02-01 1:28 ` Random832 2013-02-01 1:41 ` Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 2:03 ` Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:14 ` Warren Toomey ` (2 more replies) 2 siblings, 3 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 2:03 UTC (permalink / raw) Does anybody have a PDF of the 1974 Unix CACM paper, I seem to have misplaced my copy. The 6th Edition update to the CACM paper says: Our PDP-11 has a 1M byte fixed-head disk, used for file system storage and swapping, four moving-head disk drives which each provide 2.5M bytes on removable disk cartridges, and a single moving-head disk drive which uses removable 40M byte disk packs. The 7th Edition update says: Our own PDP-11 has two 200-Mb moving-head disks for file system storage and swapping. Thanks, Warren ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper, was Re: history of sbin? 2013-02-01 2:03 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper, was " Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 2:14 ` Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:34 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:54 ` [TUHS] history of sbin? Warren Toomey 2 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 2:14 UTC (permalink / raw) [-- Warning: decoded text below may be mangled, UTF-8 assumed --] [-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1391 bytes --] On Fri, Feb 01, 2013 at 12:03:32PM +1000, Warren Toomey wrote: > The 6th Edition update to the CACM paper says: > > Our PDP-11 has a 1M byte fixed-head disk, used for file system > storage and swapping, four moving-head disk drives which each > provide 2.5M bytes on removable disk cartridges, and a single > moving-head disk drive which uses removable 40M byte disk packs. > > The 7th Edition update says: > > Our own PDP-11 has two 200-Mb moving-head disks for file system > storage and swapping. And Dennis' paper on the Evolution of Unix says: During the last half of 1971, we supported three typists from the Patent department, who spent the day busily typing, editing, and formatting patent applications, and meanwhile tried to carry on our own work. Unix has a reputation for supplying interesting services on modest hardware, and this period may mark a high point in the benefit/equipment ratio; on a machine with no memory protection and a single .5 MB disk, every test of a new program required care and boldness, because it could easily crash the system, and every few hours’ work by the typists meant pushing out more information onto DECtape, because of the very small disk. Any guesses as to the hardware? 0.5MB: RF11-A/RS11 1.0MB: RS04/EJS04 2.5MB: RK05/RK11-D 40MB: RP03/RP11-C 200MB: My peripherals handbooks only go up to 1975. Cheers, Warren ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper 2013-02-01 2:03 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper, was " Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:14 ` Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 2:34 ` Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:54 ` [TUHS] history of sbin? Warren Toomey 2 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 2:34 UTC (permalink / raw) On Fri, Feb 01, 2013 at 12:03:32PM +1000, Warren Toomey wrote: > Does anybody have a PDF of the 1974 Unix CACM paper, I seem to have > misplaced my copy. I found it online: http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=361061. Says the same thing as the 6th Ed version: 1M byte fixed-head disk, four 2.5M disks and a removable 40M byte disk pack. Cheers, Warren ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
* [TUHS] history of sbin? 2013-02-01 2:03 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper, was " Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:14 ` Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:34 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 2:54 ` Warren Toomey 2 siblings, 0 replies; 13+ messages in thread From: Warren Toomey @ 2013-02-01 2:54 UTC (permalink / raw) And finally (I'll shut up now), the 2nd Edition kernel had hard-coded drivers for RF-11 and RK03 disks. Cheers, Warren ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 13+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~2013-02-01 3:24 UTC | newest] Thread overview: 13+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed) -- links below jump to the message on this page -- 2013-02-01 0:06 [TUHS] history of sbin? Jeremy C. Reed 2013-02-01 1:28 ` Random832 2013-02-01 1:37 ` Warner Losh 2013-02-01 1:41 ` Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 1:53 ` ramble1035 @dslextreme.com 2013-02-01 2:01 ` Larry McVoy 2013-02-01 2:02 ` Armando Stettner 2013-02-01 3:09 ` Larry McVoy 2013-02-01 3:24 ` Armando Stettner 2013-02-01 2:03 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper, was " Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:14 ` Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:34 ` [TUHS] 1974 CACM Paper Warren Toomey 2013-02-01 2:54 ` [TUHS] history of sbin? Warren Toomey
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