RE: System configuration during install

[Lawrence, David (STEI)]

Raja,

I appreciate and agree with the desire to make a portable source project.
That is what I want to do, at least within the various flavors of Linux and
Unix.  I inherited a project that was Red Hat specific and that is where my
non-Windows experience lies.  I did not mean to offend by offering the
example, I was only trying to outline my desire within the terms I
understood best.

My understanding (which may be inaccurate) is that Red Hat follows a Unix
System V init sequence, so I had felt that having the script used to launch
the daemon in /etc/rc.d/init.d and setting up startup and kill entires in
the various run levels was at least portable to other System V
implementation.  I am taking from your response that this is not the case or
may be too constraining.

If possible, I would like to support the widest range of systems possible
with the constraint that I don't as yet understand how they vary.  Would you
be able to suggest a reference that I could review about portable
configuration techniques for adding and removing dameons to a system's
initialization process?

I would think that other developers of system daemons must have already
faced this issue when porting to autotools.  Maybe you could also suggest a
project I could inspect that needs to perform this function?

I appreciate any further insight you can share.

Thanks,

David G. Lawrence
Smart Technology Enablers, Inc.
1121 Rancho Drive
Ojai, CA  93023
(805) 649-6660
(805) 649-6667 fax
address@hidden
www.enablers.com



-----Original Message-----
From: Raja R Harinath [mailto:address@hidden
Sent: Thursday, July 05, 2001 3:33 PM
To: Lawrence, David (STEI)
Cc: 'address@hidden'
Subject: Re: System configuration during install


Hi,

"Lawrence, David (STEI)" <address@hidden> writes:
> I am confiscating a large project to autotools.  I would like to
> know if there is a recommended means of adding a daemon to the
> etc/rc.d/init.d directory and then running chkconfig to add the
> daemon to run during init. 

I think thats a lot beyond the scope of Automake.  Anyway 'chkconfig'
appears to be a Redhat-only tool, and /etc/rc.d/init.d is almost
definitely a Redhat peculiarity -- so it isn't the right abstraction
if you want your package to be portable, even to other Linux
distributions.

> I know how to do it in a script, do the autotools have a specific
> way it is recommended to add it to make install?

AFAI know, the only "system integration" that happens on a standard
'make install' is the invocation of 'install-info' to regenerate the
'dir' file in $infodir.  

You can always put in an 'install-exec-hook' to do the postprocessing.
However, I don't think you'll be doing any favours to packagers (like
maintainers of RPM or DEB packages).  Also, people may not like 'make
install' changing the boot-time behaviour of a machine, and/or may not
have permissions to modify the boot-time settings.

I would suggest putting in a 'setup-boot' target to do this, and
ask people to explicitly invoke that rule to integrate your program
into the boot setup.

- Hari
-- 
Raja R Harinath ------------------------------ address@hidden
"When all else fails, read the instructions."      -- Cahn's Axiom
"Our policy is, when in doubt, do the right thing."   -- Roy L Ash