[Pkg-sysvinit-devel] Bug#339955: Bug#339955: Bug#513955: debian-policy: do not require /etc/init.d/*.sh scripts to be sourced

[Henrique de Moraes Holschuh]

On Fri, 13 Feb 2009, Russ Allbery wrote:
> I went to write the patch for this, but I paused when I saw that the other
> part of this sentence (explicitly running such scripts with sh at other
> run levels) is implemented.  The current /etc/init.d/rc runs the script
> directly if it doesn't end in .sh but runs it with sh if it does.
> 
> At least on my system, all of the scripts ending in .sh have a proper #!
> line and are executable, so this wouldn't make any difference there, but I
> wanted to double-check first before also removing that since it appears to
> be implemented.

Non-executable shell initscripts are NOT supported.  While rc might handle
them, invoke-rc.d will refuse to run them, and it also breaks the
well-understood and standard "call /etc/init.d/<initscript> <action>
directly" which everything under the sun expects to work.

It is something left over from the ancient past that we can and should get
rid of.  At most, it deserves a note on the NEWS.Debian file, if that much.

-- 
  "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