[Pkg-sysvinit-devel] Bug#553325: Uses different PATH order to /etc/profile.

[Trent W. Buck]

Package: initscripts
Version: 2.87dsf-6
Severity: minor
File: /etc/init.d/bootmisc.sh

I wanted to avoid installing unnecessary packages on a tiny system, so
I created symlinks for busybox's utilities in /bin:

    # for i in $(busybox | sed '1,/:$/d;y/,/ /')
    > do ln -s busybox /bin/$i
    > done 2>/dev/null

I thought this was perfectly safe, because /etc/profile places /bin
last in the path -- so if a "real" utility was installed, it would
automatically take precedence over the busybox symlink.  For example,

    # type -a arping
    arping is /usr/sbin/arping
    arping is /bin/arping
    # which arping
    /usr/sbin/arping

In /etc/profile:

    PATH="/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin"
    PATH="/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/games"

In /etc/init.d/bootmisc.sh:

    PATH=/sbin:/usr/sbin:/bin:/usr/bin

The result is that bootmisc.sh prefers my busybox symlinks to GNU
coreutils, leading to

    Cleaning up temporary files...find: unrecognized: -uid
    BusyBox v1.14.2 (Debian 1:1.14.2-2) multi-call binary

    Usage: find [PATH...] [EXPRESSION]
    [...]

Making these busybox symlinks is unusual, so if there is a good reason
for bootmisc.sh to disagree with /etc/profile on the search order
(#354163?), I will understand a WONTFIX.  But if it's just an
accident, it'd be convenient for me if they were made the same.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: squeeze/sid
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (990, 'testing'), (500, 'unstable'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: i386 (i686)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.30-2-686 (SMP w/1 CPU core)
Locale: LANG=en_AU.utf8, LC_CTYPE=en_AU.utf8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages initscripts depends on:
ii  coreutils                   7.4-2        The GNU core utilities
ii  debianutils                 3.2.1        Miscellaneous utilities specific t
ii  libc6                       2.9-25       GNU C Library: Shared libraries
ii  lsb-base                    4.0-0ubuntu3 Linux Standard Base 4.0 init scrip
ii  mount                       2.16.1-4     Tools for mounting and manipulatin
ii  sysv-rc                     2.87dsf-6    System-V-like runlevel change mech
ii  sysvinit-utils              2.87dsf-6    System-V-like utilities

Versions of packages initscripts recommends:
ii  e2fsprogs                     1.41.9-1   ext2/ext3/ext4 file system utiliti
ii  psmisc                        22.8-1     utilities that use the proc file s

initscripts suggests no packages.

-- no debconf information