From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Sep 4 15:31:03 2014 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [8.8.178.115]) (using TLSv1 with cipher ADH-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 1640B2DA for ; Thu, 4 Sep 2014 15:31:03 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mx01.qsc.de (mx01.qsc.de [213.148.129.14]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (Client did not present a certificate) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id CD3E71946 for ; Thu, 4 Sep 2014 15:31:02 +0000 (UTC) Received: from r56.edvax.de (port-92-195-111-1.dynamic.qsc.de [92.195.111.1]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by mx01.qsc.de (Postfix) with ESMTPS id D344E3CCD6; Thu, 4 Sep 2014 17:30:58 +0200 (CEST) Received: from r56.edvax.de (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by r56.edvax.de (8.14.5/8.14.5) with SMTP id s84FUwl4003371; Thu, 4 Sep 2014 17:30:58 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Date: Thu, 4 Sep 2014 17:30:58 +0200 From: Polytropon To: Victor Sudakov Subject: Re: /etc on a separate filesystem ? Message-Id: <20140904173058.aed32c96.freebsd@edvax.de> In-Reply-To: <20140904150739.GA42707@admin.sibptus.tomsk.ru> References: <20140904150739.GA42707@admin.sibptus.tomsk.ru> Reply-To: Polytropon Organization: EDVAX X-Mailer: Sylpheed 3.1.1 (GTK+ 2.24.5; i386-portbld-freebsd8.2) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.18-1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 04 Sep 2014 15:31:03 -0000 On Thu, 4 Sep 2014 22:07:39 +0700, Victor Sudakov wrote: > Colleagues, > > Is it possible to keep /etc on a separate filesystem? It is problematic. The file /etc/fstab is used to mount the file systems, and /etc/rc controls the whole system startup. There would have to be a replacement located on / which is later on removed from /etc, so that the desired partition can be mounted instead. Probably it's possible to achieve this goal by modifying the location of files involved in the boot process before /etc can be mounted, but that would require dealing with lower-level OS internals. For example, /fstab and /rc could be used (located on /) which make /etc available and "continue from there". But it also would mean you have _two_ fstab's and rc's. But those two aren't probably the only "offenders": what about /etc/ttys, /etc/gettytab or the /etc/rc.d/ subtree? They'll also be needed. In general, the idea doesn't look much appealing. ;-) The /etc directoriy is too fundamental to early-stage OS operations that it deserves being on the / partition. Keep in mind that it traditioally even had programs in it that were required to boot the system, like /etc/mount, /etc/GETTY or /etc/fsck. It's name /etc, meaning "et cetera", initially pointed out that there were "further programs" that were considered important to the OS. Operating systems such as UNIX System III, WEGA or SunOS / early Solaris followed that concept. Later on, /etc became the place for OS configuration files, often called "editable text configuration". :-) -- Polytropon Magdeburg, Germany Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0 Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...