Re: [BUG] inconsistency in $localstatedir and $runstatedir

[Paul Smith]

On Thu, 2022-07-14 at 14:16 +0200, Alejandro Colomar wrote:
> How can $localstatedir be $prefix/var and at the same time
> $runstatedir be /var/run (notice no prefix) if it is defined as
> $localstatedir/run.

This I don't know about: it might be a problem in the description.

> Since the FHS doesn't define /usr/local/var, and my Debian system
> lacks it, and I don't think people are going to start symlinking 
> /usr/local/var to /var, I guess the coding standard really intended
> to define $localstatedir as /var.

No, I don't think this is the case.  The GNU standards assume that all
software is installed into /usr/local by default, and that would assume
/usr/local/var.

If you want your software installed into "system" directories such as
/usr/bin, /var, /lib, etc. instead of /usr/local then you're expected
to reset these values yourself to what you want them to be when you
configure the software.

The runstatedir is a special case because it's a system-managed
directory (in that the system will clean it), which is usually shared
by all services regardless of where they're installed.  Unless the
system is supposed to also manage /usr/local/run or similar?  I hadn't
heard that but I've not checked.