From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: =?utf-8?Q?Ludovic_Court=C3=A8s?= Subject: Re: Stateful system directories Date: Sat, 19 Oct 2019 23:08:57 +0200 Message-ID: <87ftjosas6.fsf@gnu.org> References: <20191018073501.GB1224@E5400> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Return-path: Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:470:142:3::10]:54194) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1iLvy7-0006vA-Oa for guix-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 19 Oct 2019 17:09:00 -0400 In-Reply-To: <20191018073501.GB1224@E5400> (Efraim Flashner's message of "Fri, 18 Oct 2019 10:35:01 +0300") List-Id: "Development of GNU Guix and the GNU System distribution." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: guix-devel-bounces+gcggd-guix-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sender: "Guix-devel" To: Efraim Flashner Cc: guix-devel@gnu.org Hello Efraim, Efraim Flashner skribis: > Ignoring the directories in users' home directories, /var/lib/gdm has > been a source of pain on GNOME upgrades, and we still have some problems > with /var/cache/fontconfig and I believe there is something else with > permissions if you switch between ntp and openntpd. I actually have the > following snippet in my OS-config: > > ;; This directory shouldn't exist > (file-system > (device "none") > (mount-point "/var/cache/fontconfig") > (type "tmpfs") > (flags '(read-only)) > (check? #f)) I think that would work, or we could even make it a writable tmpfs? (Somehow, I do have /var/cache/fontconfig, but never hard any problems with it. It hasn=E2=80=99t been written to in months, and it=E2=80=99s onl= y writable by root anyway. Does that mean that people run into problem when they run GUIs as root?) > While we work on fixing these does it make sense to modify some of these > services to unconditionally recreate their home directories on > boot/activation? Like /var/lib/gdm? Maybe. Or maybe =E2=80=98gdm-service-type=E2=80=99 cou= ld extend =E2=80=98file-system-service-type=E2=80=99 with a tmpfs for /var/lib/gdm? I suppose that might increase startup time a bit since it=E2=80=99d be rebuilding its cache every time. Perhaps we=E2=80=99d also lose bits of st= ate, no? Thanks, Ludo=E2=80=99.