Arch Linux

rwd

Member

Registered: 2009-02-08

Posts: 664

Shouldn't /var/run and /var/run/lock point to absolute paths?

I have a setup with my 'var' on a separate partition that causes /var/run and /var/run/lock to point to nothing each time I upgrade the filesystem package and I wonder if this is a bug.

Mounted at /mnt/data is a luks encrypted partion where I keep my home and var as subdirectories. Two symlinks point to them from root:

# ls -al /
(...)
lrwxrwxrwx   1 root root    14 Apr 21  2011 home -> /mnt/data/home
lrwxrwxrwx   1 root root    13 Apr 21  2011 var -> /mnt/data/var

Each time I upgrade the filesystems package however I end up with /var/run and /var/lock pointing to  '../run' and ../run/lock', which in my case are the non-existing /mnt/data/run and /mnt/data/run/lock.  I have to delete the symlinks and make them link to the absolute  /run and /run/lock. Is there a reason the symlinks are relative instead of absolute?

[edit]
(this should have been posted in 'Pacman & Package Upgrade Issues' instead of here.)
[edit]

Last edited by rwd (2012-06-24 18:14:08)

tomegun

Developer

From: France

Registered: 2010-05-28

Posts: 661

Re: Shouldn't /var/run and /var/run/lock point to absolute paths?

I think the correct way of doing this would be not to symlink /home and /var, but rather bindmount the directories you want. I think that should give the correct result.

rwd

Member

Registered: 2009-02-08

Posts: 664

Re: Shouldn't /var/run and /var/run/lock point to absolute paths?

Thanks! After using bind mounts and  reinstalling the filesystems package the relative links work. Still I wonder why using bind mounts instead of symlinks is the 'correct' way. The only advantage I see is to have the ability to use mount options, which In my case I don't need.