Comment 5 for bug 203169

On Tue, 21 Jun 2005 21:57:35 +0200, <email address hidden> said:

> On Wed, Jan 19, 2005 at 01:30:55AM +0100, Javier Fernández-Sanguino Peña wrote:
>> --- policy.sgml.orig 2005-01-19 01:10:37.000000000 +0100
>> +++ policy.sgml 2005-01-19 01:13:05.000000000 +0100
>> @@ -5392,13 +5392,17 @@ <tag><tt>force-reload</tt></tag>
>> <item>cause the configuration to be reloaded if the service
>> supports this, otherwise restart the
>> - service.</item>
>> + service,</item>
>> +
>> + <tag><tt>status</tt></tag>
>> + <item><p>show the status of the service (either running
>> + or dead).</item>
>> </taglist>

> I don't think this is a sufficient specification.

        Umm, why? Why can't we leave it to the maintainer to determine
 the current status of the service?

> We should make it clear what status should display in the different
> case:

> 1) init script does not start a daemon
> 2.a) init script start a daemon which is running 2.b) init script
> start a daemon which is not running
> 3) init script start several daemons
> 4) init script was disabled in config

        I think rather than trying to decree a policy, and over
 engineer an optional action for an init script meant mostly for user
 consumption, we should let the developers come up with whatever works
 best for them. Heck, even the LSB says nothing more about the status
 action (apart from specifying some exit codes).

        At this point, there are no existing standards or practices
 for it to warrant a more explicit policy; once we figure out, in
 practice, what would work best, we can _then_ try making policy,
 IMHO.

        manoj

--
"We don't have to protect the environment -- the Second Coming is at
hand." James Watt
Manoj Srivastava <email address hidden> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
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