From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on inbox.vuxu.org X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.0 required=5.0 tests=MAILING_LIST_MULTI, RCVD_IN_DNSWL_NONE autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 Received: (qmail 15172 invoked from network); 22 Jul 2020 01:17:39 -0000 Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (45.79.103.53) by inbox.vuxu.org with ESMTPUTF8; 22 Jul 2020 01:17:39 -0000 Received: by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix, from userid 112) id 7EE3B9C8F7; Wed, 22 Jul 2020 11:17:34 +1000 (AEST) Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 723099C8DD; Wed, 22 Jul 2020 11:16:12 +1000 (AEST) Received: by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix, from userid 112) id 1188D9C8DD; Wed, 22 Jul 2020 11:16:09 +1000 (AEST) Received: from outgoing.mit.edu (outgoing-auth-1.mit.edu [18.9.28.11]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 5A72893D09 for ; Wed, 22 Jul 2020 11:16:08 +1000 (AEST) Received: from callcc.thunk.org (pool-96-230-252-158.bstnma.fios.verizon.net [96.230.252.158]) (authenticated bits=0) (User authenticated as tytso@ATHENA.MIT.EDU) by outgoing.mit.edu (8.14.7/8.12.4) with ESMTP id 06M1G3BD001577 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 bits=256 verify=NOT); Tue, 21 Jul 2020 21:16:04 -0400 Received: by callcc.thunk.org (Postfix, from userid 15806) id 26E5E420304; Tue, 21 Jul 2020 21:16:03 -0400 (EDT) Date: Tue, 21 Jul 2020 21:16:03 -0400 From: tytso@mit.edu To: Warner Losh Message-ID: <20200722011603.GA1536749@mit.edu> References: <862d8a34-456d-33c1-7ef0-58c6e8089de9@tnetconsulting.net> <202007211822.06LIMBJ4018831@freefriends.org> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: Subject: Re: [TUHS] /bin vs /sbin X-BeenThere: tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.26 Precedence: list List-Id: The Unix Heritage Society mailing list List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Cc: TUHS main list , Grant Taylor Errors-To: tuhs-bounces@minnie.tuhs.org Sender: "TUHS" On Tue, Jul 21, 2020 at 12:33:25PM -0600, Warner Losh wrote: > On Tue, Jul 21, 2020 at 12:23 PM wrote: > > > Grant Taylor via TUHS wrote: > > > > > To me, this makes it fairly self evident that /sbin was originally for > > > statically linked binaries. At least in Linux. > > > > Dunno about that. > > I'm skeptical as well. Yeah, that's definitely not right. /sbin had been around for "essential system binaries" long before Linux, and Linux took it from there. You can see this from the Linux Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (earlier named fsstnd, which specified /sbin as "essential system binaries"). SunOS used that nomenclature and the GNU tools all used /sbin for that purpose. The other thing I'd again urge is that you not take HJ Lu's boot/root disks as being influencial after early 1992. The Manchester Computing Centre (MCC) released their "MCC Interim Linux" distribution in February 1992, and it was so much more convenient than HJ's boot/root disk that it very quickly swept the field. MCC was succeeded by TAMU, Yggdrasil, SLS, Slackware, and by '94 you started seeing names like Debian, Red Hat, Caldera, SuSE, etc. that would be recognizeable today. Xiafs and ext2 date from '93, and so by that point while HJ was still producing his distribution, most Linux users were using other distributions. So whatever choices HJ may have made should not be considered as being representative of what "Linux" was doing at that time. > > The idea was that /etc held things specific to a box, while /bin, /sbin, > > /usr could be remote mounted from a server. This is also when /home > > came into practice as the place to hold home directories. Well, /bin and /sbin contained those binaries which would be needed so you could *mount* /usr from a server. /bin would be in normal users' PATH; while /sbin would have those binaries which only root could profitably use. So /bin/sh, /bin/cat, etc., because users and root needed to use those binaries. But /sbin/ifconfig and /sbin/route because they were primarily only useful if you were root. I'll also note that MIT Project Athena had architected a scheme using Remote Virtual Disk (essentially a network block device) so that large numbers of workstations (mostly MicroVaxen, but also some IBM PC/RT's) could share /usr mounted over RVD. This was documented in Professor Saltzer's Project Athena Technical Plan dated November 1986[1]. [1] http://web.mit.edu/saltzer/www/publications/athenaplan/e.3.1.pdf Cheers, - Ted