[pkgsrc] would you like to see /etc/pkg?

yeti

I often try to access config files of packages via /etc/pkg and only failing tab completion stops me.
Having it as symlink would be nice.
Come on! It's 2023!
We may get a bit lazy...

I do not mean to move files around.
That symlink just is like an address book entry or like an alias in the shell.
No pkgsrc contents harmed...

Are there reasons not to do it?
If so: Enlighten me.

nortonham

yeti

I voted maybe because while I like the idea in theory, I wonder if more knowledgeable people can explain some of the potential pitfalls

rvp

yeti Don't like symlinks: tab-completiom stutters on 'em. Solution? union mounts. 😈

lastflagstanding

Hello, I'm a noob with Pkgsrc so take it with a grain of salt:
If I understand you well you want a ln -s $LOCALBASE/etc /etc/pkg by default. If so:
I use Pkgsrc not on NetBSD and I install it as unpriviledged (and possibly several installations). I have to get into services with Rc.subr, but the take away is that "/etc/*" has meaning of Root for me and I like the clean separation (with a local install and config,) of priviledges emcompassed by these paths.
If this problem can be solved with a symlink, I humbly think it should not be by default and left to the user to add this convenience.
Again this is from a noob, so weight my message as negligeable and probably wrong…

yeti

lastflagstanding Your grandparents won't complain if you have their entry in your phone under "The Metusalahs"... won't even get to know that... I think a symlink is as harmful as an alias ll='ls -l' in you shell. It doesn't kill standard behaviour, it works and you get used to it. I worked a looong time in nets of customers and on a very diverse set of Nixens and caught the habit to nearly always add no nonstandard or nondefault stuff to get along (I still have no ll alias "at home"!), but I think I can drop that minimalism sometimes on guinea pigs "at home" (read that as "where I am root with screwdriver" as they may be in different locations).

hbackander

As a recent Linux->NetBSD refugee i really appreciate the distinction between / and /usr. I also feel like it would partially jeopardize the portability of pkgsrc, as it would seemingly have to extend out of $PREFIX.

yeti

hbackander but it already uses dirs in /var instead of /var/pkg or /usr/pkg/var.