Path: utzoo!utgpu!utstat!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ukma!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!adam.pika.mit.edu!scs
From: scs@adam.pika.mit.edu (Steve Summit)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: Is it me or is it my rc.local?
Message-ID: <9379@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU>
Date: 22 Feb 89 05:02:16 GMT
References: <18409@adm.BRL.MIL> <2067@solo10.cs.vu.nl>
Sender: daemon@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU
Reply-To: scs@adam.pika.mit.edu (Steve Summit)
Lines: 26

In article <18409@adm.BRL.MIL> BHAYNES%AUDUCVAX.BITNET@cunyvm.cuny.edu writes:
>        Why does the if [ -f filename] work in the rc script when
>the system boots, but not when I try it?
>...what bothers me is that it used to work and all of a sudden stoped!

In article <2067@solo10.cs.vu.nl> maart@cs.vu.nl (Maarten Litmaath)
lists three good possibilities, but misses a fourth:

     4)	your system uses a multiple universe scheme, and you
	as a user are using the ATT universe while the boot
	environment (including /etc/rc) uses the UCB universe.

For those unfamiliar with it, "[" is just an extra link to
/bin/test, which merely (as I recall) causes it too look for the
matching "]".  (I suppose this is thought to make shell scripts
look nicer; I've always considered it an unnecessary hack.)

None of this explains why Brad's daemons aren't being started
under rc, which is handling "[" correctly.  The possibilities are
endless: corrupted binaries, missing configuration files,
intermittent network connections, gronked server machines
elsewhere on the network, infrequent astral conjunctions, etc.,
etc...

                                            Steve Summit
                                            scs@adam.pika.mit.edu