rc improvements (wanted?)

[Peter Ross]

On Sun, 20 Jul 2008, Danny Braniss wrote:

> I went ahead with my idea - to reduce the list rcorder delivers, by 
> eliminating those that don't have ${name}_enable, and I opened a pandora 
> box :-)
>   - dummy dependency like SERVERS/LOGIN don't have ${name}_enable
>     nor should have.

Two options:
- Just eliminate the scripts that have the variable, and set it to "no"
- A dummy entry in /etc/defaults/rc.conf with "# Don't overwrite this"
  (So only one who really knows what he is doing will try it - hopefully)

>   - REQUIERE: xxx complains if xxx is not 'loaded' like in the case
>     of NETWORKING requirement of ppp which I don't have enabled.

Solved by point 1?

>   - some scripts rely on the existance of a ${file} which is better than
>     the original /etc/rc which used to run mountd if /etc/exports existed,
>     but does not 'conform' to the ${name}_enable paradigm.

The same?

>   - some scripts like abi don't have abi_enable, but sysvipc_enable,
>     linux_enable and svr4_enable.

I looked at this. abi is in fact a container for three start scripts.

Of course splitting them makes the situation worse..

If the ${name}_enable check becomes a function
some special cases could be treated in a case statement

case ${name} of
   mountd)
      if [ -f /etc/exports ]; then result=1; fi
      ;;
   abi)
      if [ checkyesno sysvipc -o checkyesno linux_enable .. ]; then
         result=1; fi
      ;;
   *)
      enable=eval \$${name}_enable
      if [ "X${enable}" = "X" ]; then result=1
      else result=`checkyesno ${enable}`; fi
      ;;
esac

[That's untested demo code and may contain typos]

Unfortunately the rc.d scripts are not self-contained anymore. That may 
offend some. But there is shared *.subr code already.

> All these - and some more that I probably missed - can be fixed, or the 
> warnings ignored, but is it worthwhile?

That's a good question. It is up to the users of "slower" hardware 
(e.g.embedded devices), I think.

Regards
Peter