Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!think.com!linus!agate!darkstar!ucscc.UCSC.EDU!haynes
From: haynes@ucscc.UCSC.EDU (99700000)
Newsgroups: comp.bugs.4bsd
Subject: ranlib
Message-ID: <8822@darkstar.ucsc.edu>
Date: 12 Nov 90 18:11:44 GMT
Sender: usenet@darkstar.ucsc.edu
Reply-To: haynes@ucscc.UCSC.EDU.UUCP (Jim Haynes)
Organization: University of California, Santa Cruz  CATS
Lines: 22

I'll claim this is a bug, anyway.  ranlib uses the current directory
for temporary files.  Hence the following, when done by a non-privileged
user. 

	%cd /usr/lib
	%cp libm.a /tmp/libm.a
	%ranlib /tmp/libm.a
	can't create temporary

The reason this is a pain is that I have a bunch of software all compiled
on a NFS file system, and I want to let people NFS mount the file system
(but not with root access to it) and do a "make install" to install
the software on their machines.  So the user does a cd to the top of
the software tree on the NFS file system, and issues a "make install"
The makefile copies a library to the user's machine and tries to ranlib
it there, and fails.
haynes@ucscc.ucsc.edu
haynes@ucscc.bitnet
..ucbvax!ucscc!haynes

"Any clod can have the facts, but having opinions is an Art."
        Charles McCabe, San Francisco Chronicle