On Sun, 2006-20-08 at 15:51 -0600, Bob Proulx wrote:
> Kip Warner wrote:
> > Thanks Bob. Makes perfect sense. Are the child directories in /usr
> > precede /usr/local in the order in which they appear in the path
> > environment variable?
>
> I did not quite follow the question but will try to answer it anyway.
> Usually a user's environment will include their personal directories,
> the system local directories, and official system directories.
> Basically these in pretty much this order:
>
> PATH=$HOME/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin
>
> This allows a priority of program selection with the version preferred
> by the user first, the local admin second and the system third. That
> is not an exclusive list. Both FHS and non-FHS systems have other
> directories too (e.g. /opt/bin, /usr/ccs/bin, /usr/xpg4/bin, etc.) but
> for the sake of this discussion the above is a good place to start.
> The above works as a good default.
>
> Most system processes will be just like the above but without any
> user's home and with the system binary directory. (Used to be
> statically linked system directory, but that is another story.)
>
> PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin
>
> But some system processes will want to avoid commands other than
> exactly the ones they are designed to work with and tested. There may
> be security implications in some cases. Those commands will eschew
> non-system directories and stick to just the system installed
> commands.
>
> PATH=/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin
>
> It is a judgement call as to which PATH any particular process uses.
> And different systems lean toward slightly different operating and
> security models than others and so there are variations. Some use
> 'staff' sgid directories, 'wheel' groups, etc. All generalities are
> false, including this one.
>
> Bob
>
Thank you Bob. Invaluable.
--
Kip Warner
Vertigo
http://TheVertigo.com
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Received on Mon Aug 21 13:48:49 2006