Carlos Carvalho writes: Carlos> Matthew Swift ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote on 15 November 1995 00:25: [...] Matthew> For example, I've found it strongly desirable if not necessary to Matthew> mess with files in /usr/lib/emacs/site-lisp, /usr/lib/texmf, Matthew> /usr/doc, /boot, /dev, and of course /var and /etc. Carlos> Keeping a distribution intact is an illusion. I've just installed Carlos> it and have already changed many things. A distribution is only Carlos> good for a start, particularly the base part. The packages are more Carlos> "upgradable" from the distribution.
Why don't you use the /usr/local part of the filesystem? Works perfectly well for local additions to TeX (/usr/local/lib/texmf/), emacs (/usr/local/lib/emacs/site-lisp), info files (/usr/local/info with referenes from /usr/info/dir), local configuration scripts in /usr/local/etc, local src, includes, libs and so on. Some changes have of course to be made to files in /etc or /boot --- but that's why Debian packages normally declare these files as conffiles so that they are not inadvertedly overwritten during upgrades the relevant package. -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://qed.econ.queensu.ca/~edd
