On Mon, 2009-08-17 at 11:40 -0400, Stanley Brinkerhoff wrote: > All, > > While researching some power usage information for a standard PC vs an > appliance router (assuming that gross power savings would make an > appliance essentially 'free' compared to a 'free' pc that uses more > power), I stumbled upon the Nokia IP530. Apparently Nokia makes > really nice appliance firewalls (i had no idea). > > While doing some research, I found this Wikipedia article [1] > discussing their Linux/BSD (Depending on the rev) based operating > system. The short description of the "xpand" daemon sounded > interesting -- and I was curious. Are there any other projects out > there to replace /etc with a data/metabase, and provide a legacy /etc > emulation layer? While adding some "registry" like wizardry to Linux > would probably ignore some furor, having built in versioning, > changelogs, and other "cool stuff" that such an abstraction would > provide sounds interesting. > > I know Apple has some such wizardry (though, more registry like, and > it doesnt provide an /etc legacy layer). Are there others? > I know that there have been efforts to do something similar in a database (MySQL), where the database is presented similarly to a filesystem for storing config files and the like. I haven't checked recently, but it was moving slowly about a year ago if memory serves.
We all know and love the Windows Registry for the hellish piece of architectural crap that it is, so the idea of replacing the config files with something like that is distinctly unattractive to most sane Unix and Linux admins; any replacement for /etc needs to retain the flexibility and backup-agnostic properties that make config files great, while adding the revision control and such that make then a pain in the arse to manage. SuSE's YaST tool tries to do something similar, but it overwrites all the config files with the data in it's internal database, nullifying any changes that a knowledgeable administrator may have made directly to the files themselves (i.e. it doesn't read them back in, it only writes out to them after a change). I've had some success with using CVS for version control on the files, by replacing all of the config files with symlinks to a common directory that I check in to CVS. The only complication in that is remembering to cvs up and cvs commit after each change (it's always the human element that screws up the works, isn't it?). Rubin > > > 1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_IPSO -- Rubin Bennett rbTechnologies, LLC 80 Carleton Boulevard East Montpelier, VT 05651 (802)223-4448 http://thatitguy.com "Think for yourselves and let others enjoy the privilege to do so too." Voltaire, Essay on Tolerance French author, humanist, rationalist, & satirist (1694 - 1778)
