Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!sun-barr!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!spool.mu.edu!munnari.oz.au!mel.dit.csiro.au!yarra!bacchus!craig
From: craig@bacchus.esa.oz.au (Craig Macbride)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sysv386
Subject: Installations when /tmp is a separate file system.
Keywords: isc sco unix packages install deinstall bug danger
Message-ID: <1922@bacchus.esa.oz.au>
Date: 13 Mar 91 00:17:19 GMT
References: <9113@lkbreth.foretune.co.jp> <1991Mar06.060331.6849@kithrup.COM> <350@mixcom.COM>
Organization: Expert Solutions Australia, Hawthorn, Victoria
Lines: 26

In <350@mixcom.COM> sysop@mixcom.COM (System Operator) writes:

>If you make /tmp a separate file system rather than
>leaving it a directory in the root file system, you
>must unmount /tmp before using SCO's "custom" to install
>and deinstall packages.

>Some installation scripts create links in /tmp.  If
>/tmp is a file system, this will fail, though the script
>may not notice that and continue. (A link will fail in this case
>since SCO UNIX cannot create links across file systems. This
>is a characteristic of UNIX System V, not a "feature" created by SCO.)

Pathetic, isn't it? The same sort of thing can happen when you tell ISC's
admin shell to create a /tmp partition amongst others: It goes and writes
files to /tmp and wonders why they've disappeared when it mounts the new
/tmp over them. ISC and SCO are by no means the only vendors who have
managed to do these types of things. It is amazing that when linking to,
mounting or unmounting /tmp, which is very likely to be on a separate file
system, they don't do any sort of checking.

-- 
 _____________________________________________________________________________
| Craig Macbride, craig@bacchus.esa.oz.au      | Hardware:                    |
|                                              |      The parts of a computer |
|   Expert Solutions Australia                 |        which you can kick!   |