[Pkg-sysvinit-devel] What's up with hwclock?

[Henrique de Moraes Holschuh]

On Mon, 23 Jan 2006, Thomas Hood wrote:
> >    The second script doesn't matter to us, but it
> >    should be run after /etc is writeable because it will be only useful for
> >    doing /etc/adjtime things.
> 
> We don't want to use /etc for storing data.  The data should go in /var/lib,
> which means that the second script should run at S47.

/etc/adjtime is a long time config file (as in it is as old as hwclock
itself, it has probably been with us (Linux) for a decade or more).

You'd have to symlink /var/lib/adjtime to /etc/adjtime.  Also, it is
interesting (as in it is a damn good idea to) have /etc/adjtime be applied
as early as possible, because it may kick the clock backwards or forwards
for substantial ammounts.

So, I'd leave it where it is or move it to an early writeable filesystem
(which is even better).

> > Step 2: Get glibc to manage /etc/localtime as a copy (or hardlink, when
> >    possible) of the timezone file, and not a symbolic link to it.   Thus,
> >    timezone information will be available during the entire part of the boot
> >    sequence we deal with (i.e. after / is mounted).  initrd people
> >    might want to copy that file too.
> 
> 
> You mean it would be a hardlink if /usr/share is on the root filesystem and
> a copy otherwise?

Yes.  zic already does this in some cases.  Not that it would not work just
as well if it always copy the file, but why waste space?  Using hardlinks
would fix things without making it any worse for embedded system people.

-- 
  "One disk to rule them all, One disk to find them. One disk to bring
  them all and in the darkness grind them. In the Land of Redmond
  where the shadows lie." -- The Silicon Valley Tarot
  Henrique Holschuh