From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Aug 7 12:35:16 2008 Return-Path: Delivered-To: hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D74E31065681 for ; Thu, 7 Aug 2008 12:35:16 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from peterjeremy@optushome.com.au) Received: from fallbackmx07.syd.optusnet.com.au (fallbackmx07.syd.optusnet.com.au [211.29.132.9]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 157468FC12 for ; Thu, 7 Aug 2008 12:35:15 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from peterjeremy@optushome.com.au) Received: from mail36.syd.optusnet.com.au (mail36.syd.optusnet.com.au [211.29.133.76]) by fallbackmx07.syd.optusnet.com.au (8.13.1/8.13.1) with ESMTP id m7792ZnY016069 for ; Thu, 7 Aug 2008 19:02:35 +1000 Received: from server.vk2pj.dyndns.org (c122-106-215-175.belrs3.nsw.optusnet.com.au [122.106.215.175]) by mail36.syd.optusnet.com.au (8.13.1/8.13.1) with ESMTP id m7792Uav019146 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NO); Thu, 7 Aug 2008 19:02:32 +1000 Received: from server.vk2pj.dyndns.org (localhost.vk2pj.dyndns.org [127.0.0.1]) by server.vk2pj.dyndns.org (8.14.2/8.14.2) with ESMTP id m7792UjF064338; Thu, 7 Aug 2008 19:02:30 +1000 (EST) (envelope-from peter@server.vk2pj.dyndns.org) Received: (from peter@localhost) by server.vk2pj.dyndns.org (8.14.2/8.14.2/Submit) id m7792UXp064337; Thu, 7 Aug 2008 19:02:30 +1000 (EST) (envelope-from peter) Date: Thu, 7 Aug 2008 19:02:30 +1000 From: Peter Jeremy To: wbentley@futurecis.com Message-ID: <20080807090230.GF1359@server.vk2pj.dyndns.org> References: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg=pgp-sha1; protocol="application/pgp-signature"; boundary="Swj79WlilW4BQYVz" Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: X-PGP-Key: http://members.optusnet.com.au/peterjeremy/pubkey.asc User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.18 (2008-05-17) Cc: hackers@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Idea for FreeBSD X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 07 Aug 2008 12:35:16 -0000 --Swj79WlilW4BQYVz Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On 2008-Aug-06 19:14:51 -0400, wbentley@futurecis.com wrote: > In Solaris 10 the Services Management Facility (SMF) was introduced. The main purpose of SMF appears to be to drum up business for Sun's training courses by radically changing Sol10 Administration for little benefit. >Basically what it does, is take all the rc.d scripts and puts them into >a database to manage. Everything is converted to XML and two basic >commands (svcs and svcadm) are used to manage everything. So you take each line from inetd.conf (literally) and wrap it in several KB of XML. This definitely adds to bloat and doesn't even obey the spirit of XML (since the content of each inetd.conf entry remains opaque). I haven't looked at what happens to /etc/inittab or the rc.d scripts but I expect that it's similar. It's not clear what benefit this brings. The svcs and svcadm commands are among the most arcane I have bumped into during my >20 years of administering Unix. I agree that some of the process management facilities of SMF are better than exists for most FreeBSD daemons but don't believe that all the other baggage is worth the improvement. With FreeBSD, I can configure virtually all the system via a single text file - which is easily found and kepy under configuration control. With Sol10, there are random bits of configuration spread all over the system and there is no obvious way to control configuration. --=20 Peter Jeremy Please excuse any delays as the result of my ISP's inability to implement an MTA that is either RFC2821-compliant or matches their claimed behaviour. --Swj79WlilW4BQYVz Content-Type: application/pgp-signature Content-Disposition: inline -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (FreeBSD) iEYEARECAAYFAkiauiYACgkQ/opHv/APuIc6ywCgs/RJWDqmCNF17ufVW4dUUiw6 2zsAnjsYrHyYGRPgvYY2obRUECPBxLJM =3ZZU -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --Swj79WlilW4BQYVz--