On Wed, 16 Feb 2005 09:00:37 +0100, Marc Haber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Another topic that needs to be addressed with putting /etc under > version control is file modes and owner/group. cvs doesn't handle that > well at all.
Version management is different from backups, while both share some common functionality. With backups you just want an easy way to restore them. Version management is to keep track of who changed what and when (and even why in a changelog). I use subversion to manage a portion of my /etc tree. Most of the files in my repository are the ones I modified from a standard package install. Sometimes I put unmodified files in there to keep track of package upgrades. But little of them are generated files. I keep passwd itself in there, but not the shadow files with the actual passwords. There are a lot of symlinks outside the /etc tree, so don't put them in the repository (alternatives, ssl certificates, etc). As subversion does not keep keep track of file permissions, it is not really suited for backups. You can not easily restore a checkout. That's why weekly or daily backups are handy. Just restore the latest backup and synchronize with your repository. This way you do not need to keep a lot of backup files around, as most interesting information is in your repository anyway. With tools like trac, websvn or viewcvs it is very easy to take a peek at how a certain file changed over time. I use trac myself, as it has an integrated wiki to document various things. Recently I've been looking whether it's worthwhile to switch to arch (with bazaar) and I think it stores file permissions. But I don't think it's worth the switch yet. > Also, the repository needs to be protected as /etc itself is, as it > contains passwords and other system confidential data. So don't store them in a repository. You should ask yourself whether you're interested in the history or not. If you are store them in a repository. If you just want the latest version put them in a backup. -Olaf -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]