On Sun, Oct 19, 2003 at 12:52:52PM -0700, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> On Sunday 19 October 2003 12:36 pm, I sent a message with a few ugly
> typos.
>
> It should have read:
> > This may be an incredibly stupid question. Nevertheless I'm gonna
> ask...
> >
> > Is it safe and sane in a RELENG_5_1 system to create and use
> > /var/ tmp via a script in /etc/rc.local:
> >
> > [no entry in FSTAB]
> > mdconfig -a -t swap -s ... -u 10
> > newfs -O2 /dev/md10
> > mount /md10 /var/tmp
> > chmod 1777 /var/tmp
Using a memory based filesystem for /tmp (rather than /var/tmp) is
certainly viable. Which ever temporary file system is involved, you
should be able to configure it entirely out of /etc/fstab -- see the
mdmfs(8) man page.
Historically /var/tmp was always a "real" filesystem and the contents
of /var/tmp were expected to persist across reboots. Stuff in /tmp
was expected to disappear. However, nowadays that distinction is
fading away and many people will advise you to have just one temporary
file system and use sym-links to make it appear in all of the expected
places.
Running with a memory based /var/tmp should be fine generally. You'll
need to double check that you aren't running any applications which
rely on the persistence of /var/tmp over reboots. That's going to be
uncommon nowadays, but there are a couple of examples I can think of
directly: eg. vi(1) won't be able to recover editor files across
reboots and the TeX/LaTeX/metafont font cache will be wiped out by the
reboot and so forth.
Cheers,
Matthew
--
Dr Matthew J Seaman MA, D.Phil. 26 The Paddocks
Savill Way
PGP: http://www.infracaninophile.co.uk/pgpkey Marlow
Tel: +44 1628 476614 Bucks., SL7 1TH UK
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