Packages adding groups in %pre/post

Chris Adams cmadams at hiwaay.net
Sun Dec 21 16:03:23 UTC 2008


Once upon a time, Jesse Keating <jkeating at redhat.com> said:
> I've noticed that in some situations, packages that add users/groups in
> %pre/post can fail.  What I most often see happening is while groupadd
> or useradd is installed, and properly requested by Requires(pre) or
> Requires(post) on shadow-utils, the /etc/group and /etc/passwd files
> themselves aren't in place.  These come from the setup package.
> 
> Should the shadow-utils package Require the setup package, or require it
> in such a way that it is in place before anything that calls
> shadow-utils?  Should the packages that need to add users/groups not
> only Requires(foo) on shadow-utils, but also setup?

I'd say that if useradd and groupadd can't work without /etc/passwd and
/etc/group, then shadow-utils should require /etc/passwd and /etc/group
(wouldn't a file Requires make more sense than a static package
Requires?).  It doesn't make sense to change a bunch of packages to
require setup, since that could always change (and what a PITA that
would be).

-- 
Chris Adams <cmadams at hiwaay.net>
Systems and Network Administrator - HiWAAY Internet Services
I don't speak for anybody but myself - that's enough trouble.




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