Olive wrote:
> Something that I do like in Slackware is that the build scripts to generate

s/do/don't/

> Slackware packages assume that they will be run as root. Moreover the tool
> buildpkg does not allow to set the correct owner of the files in a package

s/buildpkg/makepkg/ i assume?

> without doing a chown on the to-be-packaged directory (which requires to be
> root);

no, it's not makepkg that doesn't allow you to do this, it's linux that
doesn't allow you to do this. it'd be a great thing if every user could
create a file and then change ownership of it to root. /not/.

> This approach contradicts the philosophy of never being root when you do not
> really need to.

no, it doesn't, because you really *do* need to be root in order to make a
package that has to be installed system-wide. why? because tar retains
ownership and permissions of files. if you were to create a package as user
and then install it as root system-wide, the files *and* the directories in
the package would obtain ownership and permissions of the user that created
the package.

now, note that if a tar ball (and therefore also in a slackware package)
contains a file /usr/bin/someprog, it will also list the directories /usr
and /usr/bin. so if you were to install a package that was created by a
user system-wide, the directories /usr and /usr/bin would get ownership of
the user. as a result, those directories would be *writable* for that
user. which is not what you want.

> That's said, Slackware is still my preferred distro; but that does not
> prevent me to point out some negative points ...

well, i hope i have convinced you that it is not a negative point, but that
it is inevitable to do it this way: a package that's to be installed
system-wide must be created as root, because its directories and files must
be owned by root.

--
Joost Kremers joostkremers@yahoo.com
Selbst in die Unterwelt dringt durch Spalten Licht
EN:SiS(9)