Why is spot not in /home?

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mikeb
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Why is spot not in /home?

#1 Post by mikeb »

Just wondered... same goes for the web server and ftpd for that matter
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#2 Post by bark_bark_bark »

I thought about asking that before.
....

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#3 Post by mikeb »

LOL... great minds thinking alike or fools never differing?

Well I moved them and seemed to work ok...declutters the /root folder and seems more at home with running underprivelidged. (is that how you spell it?)
You just change the paths in /etc/passwd.

I wont speak about the windows 95 my-willywarmer folders. :D

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#4 Post by bark_bark_bark »

I prefer to have the files on my computer organized. Sometimes to get to a file, I have to click through a few layers on folders; Other times, there are loose files in the My Documents, My Music, My Pictures, My Videos, and Downloads folders.
....

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#5 Post by mikeb »

My arse ....

sorry.

well the family understand and have no problem with having a storage partition and a series of folders. .../root profile seems a little perverse and the my thing is definately windows perversity at its best.

Or is it an ego thing .. MY documents..MY apps...

If we keep talking we might get a answer about spot.

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#6 Post by bark_bark_bark »

It's odd that spot is in /root, but that's not the only thing that is odd.

It's odd that people hate on Windows Vista, when it was an actually decent version (some would say it's even better than Windows 7).

But let's just talk about /root, the folder "spot", and folder structure like we were before; or else this will get off-topic and no answer will be given.
....

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#7 Post by smokey01 »

Do you have a /home when running live?

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mikeb
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#8 Post by mikeb »

No /home s in standard pups... the idea that non root activity should live in /home is a common unix/linux idea thats all..ie to keep it away from the root/admin profile

There are plenty of oddball folders already so a standard one would not hurt.

mike

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#9 Post by bigpup »

Puppy does not use /home the way other versions of Linux do.

/root is used the way other Linux versions use /home.

In Puppy it is mnt/home
mnt/home is used as the mount point for the location of the Puppy main files.
Like Puppy.sfs, puppysave.2fs, the Puppy files directory, etc....

It all has to do with how frugal and live installs work in Puppy.

Just look at what is in mnt/home to best see what it is used for.

Yes you can put stuff in mnt/home, but it is not part of the main Puppy.sfs file or in the save file or save folder.
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Re: Why is spot not in /home?

#10 Post by jamesbond »

mikeb wrote:Just wondered... same goes for the web server and ftpd for that matter
mike
Why not? Not all logins must have home in /home. In my Debian system (as mainstream as you can get), "mail" account lives in /var/mail. "www-data" lives in /var/www, and "nobody" lives in /nonexistent (ie, really a directory that does not exist), "sshd" lives in /var/run/sshd, "main" lives in /var/cache/man, "daemon" lives in /usr/sbin, etc I believe I made my point. In fact, of all 30 odds accounts in that system, only a single one lives in /home, that is, an account that I created for myself.

Before you say that "but all those are system accounts!", I would say that "spot" is also a system account, it is not a regular user account, as it comes pre-defined and is used for one very specific purpose - as a "root-surrogate". Something like "nobody" account but with a little bit more rights. Thus as a system account, spot can live anywhere convenient for its purpose, and in this case, /root/spot :D
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#11 Post by Ted Dog »

So can we move spot elsewhere, under root bugs me I do not think it its extra unsafe where it is, but I have seen directory parent permission take over I even used that trick to fix a broken install as a regular user. when the ROOT admin was still having to read the books for everything 2 weeks after getting the job.
Of course I was a dark wizard for using a 20+ year undocumented BSD flag to do it. She had it out for me and got me demoted and removed as web admin ( which for that group was a blessing ) I did not mean to 'show her up' :evil: People still by-past her to have me fix things and I saved her bacon once during a cyber-attack by firewall tricks ( again regular user, the rest of team never told her I helped, I jokingly told them I did not need Admin rights and could do the trick with my back to the keyboard, which they had me prove :D , and I did :roll: )

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#12 Post by mikeb »

/mnt/home is a puppy ism..less said about that the better and nothing whatsoever to do with users/permissions. Indeed spot would fall to bits on a fat partition lol.

/home is for non priviledged user accounts... I would have classed spot as that if nothing else even if its not a full implementation. Profiles are creates with spot:spot ownership...sounds familiar. www and ftp..ok system ones...though pop them out the way as you mention.
Separating the full blown root profile from this spot one just seems appropriate.. its the puppy way of providing a user profile so it should be treat as one.
Also if something like useradd was used rather than the mini adduser then then it would add users to /home ...i used that for my multiuser pups..but I digress.

Ok change the question to 'why is the admin /root profile being used for inappropriate non root (admin) profile related content ?'

Actually thats closer to the reason for the post... a new user is greeted by a huge pile of 'unrelated to his profile' junk...is the aim to confuse the hell out of them...lighthouse was a nightmare.... might be geek heaven but hardly an invite to someone unfamiliar with linux.
Also as mentioned if they are 'system' folders then keep them out of the way of a new user with root priviledges who could easily mess up something the system will need at some point...I assume thats why they exist.

Rationalize it all you want like much of what goes on here...its still a mess that could be easily tidied.

Historically sounds like a puppy 1 hangover where only home was being saved...that was a little while ago.

mike

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#13 Post by jamesbond »

Rationalize it all you want.
That goes both way isn't it? :lol: Interesting question, interesting answers, but you can't blame others of "rationalising their excuses" if they don't accept your view. It's simply that different views exist.

Anyway, my explanations probably won't change your mind and I don't expect them to. At the very least other readers can make an informed judgement based on our friendly banter.
/home is for non priviledged user accounts.
Correction - note that /home is "traditional" mount point for non-privileged "login" user accounts. First point: "traditional" implies that you can mount it elsewhere (and often, with large system with large SAN-backed partition it is elsewhere). Second point: it is usually only for "login" user accounts, that is, for real user who actually use that account for logging in. Not for a system account. As given above, in Debian system many other non-logged in user accounts have their homes in various parts of the system. "spot" falls into this category, you are not supposed to login as "spot".

But again, this is more of a convention. Who gets to decide that "ftp" account should be in /home/ftp or /var/ftp? Does "killall" belongs to /bin or /usr/bin? Choose your poison ... I digress :lol:
Ok change the question to 'why is the admin /root profile being used for inappropriate non root (admin) profile related content ?'
Because as explained above (in Fatdog at least) "spot" is "root-surrogate": It is the account used by root then it wants to do it as non-root user. E.g, running the browser as non-root user from a root account, etc. One does not login to spot, root does it as and when needed. So I would deem is appropriate, at least for convenience reasons (easy to drag-drop items from /root to /root/spot and vice versa - because (see below) - spot files and root files don't mix).
Separating the full blown root profile from this spot one just seems appropriate.. its the puppy way of providing a user profile so it should be treat as one.
It is indeed separate. "spot" cannot access /root (again, at least in Fatdog). Everything in /root are root:root, except /root/spot and everything in /root/spot is spot:spot
Also if something like useradd was used rather than the mini adduser then then it would add users to /home ...i used that for my multiuser pups..but I digress.
useradd is standard issue in Fatdog, as well as true multuser capability, and has been for years too. Don't like spot, sure, just create a new user account and login as true non-root user. Want to run three desktop sessions at the same time (one as root, one as user1, one as user2), each running different browser sessions and switch between them (aka, XP's "Fast User Switching") using Ctrl-Alt-Fx keys, as easy as switching between Xorg and virtual consoles, and locked with password if need be? No problem :lol: I can't speak of this for other pups, though.
a new user is greeted by a huge pile of 'unrelated to his profile' junk...is the aim to confuse the hell out of them...
A new user is always confused, no questions about it :lol: Expecting Linux to work like Windows is futile, as futile as expecting Debian to work like FreeBSD or like RHEL, or like Puppy. Some learning curve is always needed - it's just a matter of how steep.
Also as mentioned if they are 'system' folders then keep them out of the way of a new user with root priviledges who could easily mess up something the system will need at some point...I assume thats why they exist.
No matter files are located, someone with root access can always make a mess. Messing with spot is less of a concern :) Fortunately, pfix=ram (or savefile=none for Fatdog) always fixes things. If you run frugal, that is.

That being said, my *guess* the only reason why spot is still in /root/spot is because many scripts have it hardcoded. It is easier and faster to type "/root/spot" rather than "awk -F: '$1=="spot"{print $6}' /etc/passwd" as it should be, and I am guilty of that too. Perhaps I should start migrating my scripts to use that awk command to anticipate the day we move spot's home elsewhere.
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#14 Post by mikeb »

Technical debate eh :)

No problem.
Yes you mention scripts... hardcoding more a general problem... instead of using $HOME or ~ for example and use of /tmp when its profile related. ...I believe this has been improved over time.

As you point out linux is a free for all... an absense of standards and common methods...well thats a wider issue indeed ... so I suppose there is always an element that wants something more consistant to try and get the world to make linux be taken more seriously... so its not so much MY way as trying to get some form of order in there.... part of the puppy evolution in my head which should in no way detract from its uniqueness....there was that standards thread a while ago about this.

My view is that /root became the dumping ground for system stuff rather than being the admins/puppy users profile folder. (historical /root only save reason) Makes it cluttered and messy. I suggest its not a very 'linux methods way' either though what that is is debatable.
I also question the desire to have applications installed in there... again non technical user with direct access to their shiny software seems an accident waiting to happen. Also makes the PATHS messy.

Since making for many a year puplets, the root folder is free and configs that belong in there are hidden.. only the user startup folder is included ... the rest is for the user to use... though as root they are free to destroy the system, /root is where their home is..their documents ... indeed I have to explain many a time that you can actually go elsewhere in puppy..ie 'up'

I also have sometimes put a symlink to /mnt/home or nowadays to an actual partition ..whatever is being used for data storage.
In other words yer stuff in in /root .... and thats it.

Just for a simpler life really.

The initial question...I wanted to know if there was any 'technical' reason for the spot in root but as such there seems to be non ..its just habit it seems so ok to move it :) ...
next build will be altered in this way :)

All good fun

mike

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#15 Post by bigpup »

The initial question...I wanted to know if there was any 'technical' reason for the spot in root but as such there seems to be non
Simple answer.
That is the place Barry K. put it when he decided to have spot.
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#16 Post by mikeb »

Simple answer.
That is the place Barry K. put it when he decided to have spot.
I have found some inventive locations for locales too :)

Mike

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#17 Post by 01micko »

Me, well I think this is a valid discussion... why not /home/spot? Even /etc/spot or /var/spot? (being a system account and all).

The absence of (adhered to) standards in G(u*)NU/Linux is partly why systemd sprung up and there is plenty of yay or neighing about that.

It's certainly not difficult to move spot, the biggest problem is backward compatibility which has hardly been given a care in puppyland since I've been here.

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#18 Post by jamesbond »

@mikeb - problem with standards are:
- there are too many of them
- the proponents don't follow them either
- some of them are too onerous
- some of them don't make sense.

@mikeb - "My view is that /root became the dumping ground for system stuff rather than being the admins/puppy users profile folder".
Fully agreed. It should not be.

@mikeb - "I also question the desire to have applications installed in there... "
Some people (e.g. sunburnt) come from the other side which definitely hates to have programs spread files over /usr, /opt, /etc and whatnot; and prefer to have an application that is self-contained in a directory, and preferably can be installed/removed by a non-root user (this is the reason for Rox Apps, by the way); and this case the only reasonable place to put the apps is in their home folder.

@mikeb - "the root folder is free and configs that belong in there are hidden.. only the user startup folder is included ... the rest is for the user to use..."
"These worlds are yours except Europa. Attempt no landing there." --> "These files are yours except spot. Attempt no messing around there (unless you already know what you are doing)" :)

@mikeb - "The initial question...I wanted to know if there was any 'technical' reason for the spot in root"

I think bigpup and yourself already answered the question yourself - because BarryK put it there, and because in the past only content of /root was saved. No other technical reasons.

@mikeb - "All good fun"
Certainly, it has been invigorating :)

@01micko - "why not /home/spot? Even /etc/spot or /var/spot"
What do you gain by moving? I had the chance to move it out when we re-architect Fatdog64 600, but in the end we chose not to.

@01micko - "The absence of (adhered to) standards in G(u*)NU/Linux is partly why systemd sprung up and there is plenty of yay or neighing about that."
You know this is propaganda from the systemd camp, right? :twisted: There are many of them: FHS, LSB, freedesktop, etc etc. Now there is another one, the "systemd standard" :lol:

@01micko - "It's certainly not difficult to move spot, the biggest problem is backward compatibility which has hardly been given a care in puppyland since I've been here."
Moving from PET to TXZ package is easier. You simply declare that PET is not supported, older packages will not work. This sets the expectation right. Then later you can add a small print that says, "actually it sorts-of ... may be ... perhaps ... work. Here is a converter for you, but no guarantee that it will work even if you can convert it."

Moving /root/spot elsewhere is more subtle, because you can't simply declare in advance which PETs will continue to work and which ones won't, though the majority probably will.
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#19 Post by mikeb »

Hmm yes that rox only way of running things ... seems a lack of the appreciation of the joys of sfs union layering to me :D ..but that was an old battle.

Actually as regards moving the offending folder, since anything run as spot would be using the path set in passwd it suggests nothing would need altering/fixing and only an extra icon to the 'sandboxed' spot folder on the desktop perhaps.
One of the less painful changes. Unless of course the hard coded paths bunny is hopping around.
(if anyone has every suffered SONY's sonic stage software you will know all about the joy of its hard coded profile paths...move nothing or else!!!)

Well glad its been food for thought... pup=$(( simple + fast + small )) in my head and and anything that appears to be != I feel needs the maginifying glass and deer stalker treatment :)

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#20 Post by jamesbond »

mikeb wrote:Actually as regards moving the offending folder, since anything run as spot would be using the path set in passwd it suggests nothing would need altering/fixing and only an extra icon to the 'sandboxed' spot folder on the desktop perhaps.
One of the less painful changes. Unless of course the hard coded paths bunny is hopping around.
Thanks to this discussion, I have updated my scripts to use $SPOT_HOME (which gets its value by awk-ing /etc/passwd) instead of /root/spot. These are not ordinary scripts; they are the configuration scripts that needs to keep root-spot configuration in sync (e.g, if you change the cursor for root, you need to do the same for spot otherwise if you run browser as spot, that browser will display the *old* cursor and you've got questions like "I have changed my cursor and it takes effect everywhere except on firefox" :D ). I don't know how many of these kind of scripts are in standard puppies, 01micko would be in a better position to answer that.

EDIT: We're not moving /root/spot, but modifying this scripts now helps to anticipate the day we do.
(if anyone has every suffered SONY's ...
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