Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1999 19:27:46 +0000 From: Ben Smithurst <ben@scientia.demon.co.uk> To: Alan Bawden <Alan@LCS.MIT.EDU> Cc: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: messing with /etc/rc.conf Message-ID: <19990108192746.B63511@scientia.demon.co.uk> In-Reply-To: <8Jan1999.042549.Alan@LCS.MIT.EDU> References: <8Jan1999.042549.Alan@LCS.MIT.EDU>
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Alan Bawden wrote:
> There is a comment at the front of /etc/rc.conf that says:
>
> # All arguments must be in double or single quotes.
Which is not quite true, arguments like YES or NO needn't be quoted, but
try explaining that to lusers...
> It's not clear exactly what the restriction here is, but I recently learned
> that if rc.conf contains the following:
>
> ntpdate_flags="-bs $(awk '$1 == "server" || $1 == "peer" {print $2}' /etc/ntp.conf)"
>
> something will occasionally re-write this to read:
>
> ntpdate_flags="-bs $(awk '$1 == "
Well obviously, since the first non-escaped quote will terminate the
quoted string. Escape the quotes by preceding them with a backslash
within the quoted string and it might work:
ntpdate_flags="-bs $(awk '$1 == \"server\" || $1 == \"peer\" {print $2}' /etc/ntp.conf)"
> 1. What is it that makes this change. And what exactly are the rules it
> applies when parsing/rewriting the file?
The file is parsed by sh(1), read it's man page for quoting rules.
> 2. If I move the setting of ntpdate_flags into /etc/rc.conf.local, will
> whatever this thing is leave it alone there?
No, it's still parsed by sh(1).
--
Ben Smithurst
ben@scientia.demon.co.uk
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