SUMMARY advfs & home directories Re: V5.0 vs V3.2 a bunch of questions

From: Lucio Chiappetti <lucio_at_ifctr.mi.cnr.it>
Date: Wed, 12 Apr 2000 12:31:02 +0200 (MET DST)

I asked about a problem with a new system configured by external guys using
advfs and using a different convention for home directories than we use. This
is happily solved.


> Lucio Chiappetti wrote:

> > The machine has been configured by the other guy with advfs. I use
> > ufs on my systems. Also he has three filesets (are they called so ?)
> >
> > - one for / (on the same 1 GB physical disk as swap)
> > - one for /usr and one for /var (on a 4 GB disk)

> > Also he has home directories on /usr/users/xxxx, while our local
> > convention for all other machines is that home directories are on
> > /machinename/xxxx.

On Tue, 11 Apr 2000, Nikola Milutinovic wrote:

> Interesting convention. So far I've seen /usr/users/ and /home/. I hope you're
> not storing them on root file system.

I'd first comment about conventions for home directories, then I give the
solution(s).

Of course we do NOT keep home directories on the root file system. Actually
all the purpose of our convention is that we do not want to store them on ANY
system filesystem. Our convention is :

  - all machines usually are installed with / swap /usr on partitions a b
    and g of the system disk (if a machine comes preinstalled with a separate
    /var partition we keep it, otherwise not)

  - for the rare, small machines with a single disk, usually there is also
    a partition h, which is called /xxxx where xxxx is the hostname, and
    home directories are there

  - for the typical machines, there is at least one more [hysical disk, which
    we define as partition c and associate to /xxxx where xxxx is the
    hostname, and home directories are there

  - we have only one machine on which all are entitled to login, and this
    machine auto-mounts all the /xxxx directories

  - in each group of machines, the local manager can authorize users of
    the group to log on any machine by auto-mounting the /xxxx directory
    where their home is

  - in all other cases (no home, user will be logging with home on /) we
    deny this possibility with different mechanisms (.login or csh.login)

Now the solution to my problem. The new machine has usr_domain#usr and
usr_domain#var filesets and home on /usr/users.

(1) first solution (works, worked for 1 day than moved to solution 3)

    define the home dir as /xxx/user in the NIS maps
    on machine xxx create a soft link /xxxx -> /usr/users
    on machine xxx exports /usr/users
    on the central server mount xxxx;/usr/users

(2) suggested by Jonathan Nicholson <jjn_at_sanger.ac.uk>, untested

The better way to do that would be to use the -m option in the exports file:-
(-m doesn't appear to be documented!)

/machinename -m=/usr/users some_host
This will export the path /usr/users as /machinename. So on another node
you could mount the volume as machinename:/machinename

(3) final solution
    
    after quick reading of my old 3.2 sys adm guide find that with advfs
    it's EXTREMELY EASY to define a new fileset at any time without need
    to changing the partitions !

       mkfset usr_domain xxxx
       mkdir /xxxx
       mounted usr_domain#xxxx on /xxxx
       moved the content of /usr/users into /xxxx
       exported /xxxx

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Lucio Chiappetti - IFCTR/CNR - via Bassini 15 - I-20133 Milano (Italy)
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"This land .. is my land .. e no xe una portaerei"
[English in the original] [and is not an aircraft carrier]
                             M.Paolini - I cani del gas - Bestiario italiano
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Received on Wed Apr 12 2000 - 10:34:10 NZST

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