Subject: Someone working on support for NFS mounted "/usr"?

From: [email-masked] (Kevin Buhr)
Date: 15 Aug 1996 16:41:15 -0500

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(Sorry to those who see this twice:  it looks like our local news
 server has all the "linux.*" groups marked as unmoderated.)

As near as I can tell from examining various FAQs, there is no support
for maintaining clients with a read-only, NFS-mounted "/usr"
partition.  The only current solution seems to be: (i) install a
complete system on the server and a base system on the client; 
(ii) remove the client "/usr" partition and mount the server "/usr" in
its place; (iii) configure the client's packages by hand.

Is anyone working on support for NFS-mounted "/usr" partitions (as
opposed to NFS-mounted installation)?  (I'm imagining support in
"dselect/dpkg" to check the server's package versions, update
non-"/usr" files, and perform needed configuration, possibly even
remotely.)

Kevin <[email-masked]>

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From: [email-masked] (joost witteveen)
Date: Mon, 19 Aug 1996 15:58:14 +0200 (MET DST)

> its place; (iii) configure the client's packages by hand.

Well, as far as I (and about 5 happy clients (who mount /usr from
my servre) can see, you're somewhat wrong.

The only trouble is /etc: it has to be mounted rw (/etc/mounts, and
/etc/ld.so.cach), and has to have some files different from
the server (like /etc/init.d/network, setting up different IP numbers).

But on the /usr side, its all _very_ easy!

Contact me if you have problems.

-- 
joost witteveen
            [email-masked]
          [email-masked]
--
Use Debian/GNU Linux!

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From: [email-masked] (Kevin Buhr)
Date: 19 Aug 1996 09:47:15 -0500

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[email-masked] (joost witteveen) writes:
| 
| > As near as I can tell from examining various FAQs, there is no support
| > for maintaining clients with a read-only, NFS-mounted "/usr"
| > partition.  The only current solution seems to be: (i) install a
| > complete system on the server and a base system on the client;
| > (ii) remove the client "/usr" partition and mount the server "/usr" in
| > its place; (iii) configure the client's packages by hand.
| 
| Well, as far as I (and about 5 happy clients (who mount /usr from
| my servre) can see, you're somewhat wrong.

I don't mean to be ungrateful, but your message doesn't shed much
light on the issue.  Perhaps you could supply a bit more detail?

How do you install/configure packages on the client side?  How do you
synchronize package installation and upgrades between the server and
the client?  How does your solution differ from my proposed (and in my
opinion, pretty bad) solution---that is, how do you avoid configuring
the client's packages by hand?

| The only trouble is /etc: it has to be mounted rw (/etc/mounts, and
| /etc/ld.so.cach), and has to have some files different from
| the server (like /etc/init.d/network, setting up different IP numbers).
| 
| But on the /usr side, its all _very_ easy!

Well, yes, but I already knew that.  I want to know what you *do* for
the client "/etc" partitions?  Do you run a nightly script to update
the client's "/etc"?  How does your script determine what should and
shouldn't be overwritten in "/etc"?