From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
From: ludo@gnu.org (Ludovic =?utf-8?Q?Court=C3=A8s?=)
Subject: Re: statedir locations
Date: Tue, 28 Jan 2014 10:23:16 +0100
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References: <20140127115015.GA13396@jocasta.intra> <87ha8pk2ew.fsf@gnu.org>
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In-Reply-To: <87bnyxhwil.fsf@gnu.org> ("Ludovic
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To: John Darrington <john@darrington.wattle.id.au>
Cc: guix-devel@gnu.org

ludo@gnu.org (Ludovic Court=C3=A8s) skribis:

> ludo@gnu.org (Ludovic Court=C3=A8s) skribis:
>
>> John Darrington <john@darrington.wattle.id.au> skribis:
>>
>>> It has come to my attention that guix packages (at least those with gnu=
 build system)
>>> default their statedirs to directories under /nix/store/.  Recall that =
the statedirs (ie:=20
>>> sharedstatedir localstatedir and runstatedir) are for installing data f=
iles *which the programs
>>> modify while they run* [1].   Obviously a program cannot modify anythin=
g under /nix/store
>>> I think we need to update the default configure flags.
>>
>> Yes.  We actually have a number of local modifications:
>>
>>   $ grep -e --localstatedir gnu/packages/*.scm | wc -l
>>   5
>>
>> I think we should change gnu-build-system.scm to pass
>> --localstatedir=3D/var, unless =E2=80=98configure-flags=E2=80=99 specify=
 another setting.
>>
>> I=E2=80=99ll do that in =E2=80=98core-updates=E2=80=99.
>
> Done in 65529e49ff5b9052544271b1b7923feed4312849.

I was overconfident: the patch broke everything, because
Automake-generated makefiles typically try to mkdir $localstatedir:

  http://hydra.gnu.org/eval/45514

So I just reverted it, and I think we=E2=80=99re stuck with the status quo =
until
someone has a better idea.

For the longer term, we could submit an Automake patch such that it
doesn=E2=80=99t insist on creating $localstatedir et al.

Ludo=E2=80=99.