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Define - /etc?
ogar572 asks: "There has been an ongoing and heated debate around the office concerning the definition of what /etc means on *nix operating systems. One side says "et cetera" per Wikipedia. Another side says it means 'extended tool chest' per this gnome mailing list entry or per this Norwegian article. Yet another side says neither, but he doesn't remember exactly what he heard in the past. All he remembers is that he was flamed when he called it 'et cetera', but that 'extended tool chest' didn't sound right either. So, what does it really mean?"
It means etc...
Shin: a device for finding furniture in the dark.
Enormous Trove of Configuration files, that's what it is.
"/var" didn't exist until long after "/etc" was created; so, you can't look to /var's use to provide a clue to /etc's origins.
/etc is exactly three months older than /var. Amazing!!
server / # ls -lah
total 72K
drwxr-xr-x 47 root root 4.0K Feb 11 10:23 etc
drwxr-xr-x 14 root root 4.0K May 11 2005 var
Wow, you're right.
adventure-today.com
"Eh... That's where them Config files goes"
'linked-in binaries'. Here's some of the other TLAs: /lib: linked-in binaries /etc: extended tool chest /usr: unix system routines /bin: basic instructions (native) /var: volatile access region /opt: one per terminal /tmp: this maybe purged /mnt: multiple network things /dev: dont ever violate /sys: she's your sister
You see, the etc hierarchy on Unix was the successor the etb hierarchy on Unics, which was named for the ETA configuration mechanism on Multics, which was named for ETA OIN SHRDLU. So, now you know.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
...Etc Text Configuration.
Sorry, I'm an early morning drunk. I meant "Essential Text Configurations"
Beer! It's what's for breakfast!
If you read a million lines of C with lots of good comments, you'd figure out the syntax before you finished.
;)
And if you read a millions lines of Perl, you would come to the conclusion that it has no syntax, then you would scratch your eyes out with a ball point pen.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
Shit.
I think you're misreading the output. /etc is from Feb 11 of this year, while /var is from May 11 of 2005. So /var is actually a few years older.
My other car is first.
emacs - Escape Meta Alt Control Shift.
gdb - Get Down Baby.
gcc - Give Communism (a) Chance.
linux - Linus Is Not Usually Xeroflulogitic.
lisp - Lisp Is (for) Symbolic Programming.
java - Just Another Variant (of) Ada.
perl - Perl Essentially Resembles Lisp.
printf - People Rarely Insist (on) Naming This Function.
sed - Slashdot (is) Easily Duped.
top - Totally Ongoing Programs.
vi - Very Irritating.
I used a mechanical pencil. When scratching out your eyes there's more than one way to do it.
lisp = lots (of) infuriating, superfluous parentheses
because when the system looks for the top-level directory, it would have to iterate through more directories to get a match. Duh. People think that just because 'cd /etc/init.d/' and 'cd /usr/local/include/emacs/emacs2.1/site-lisp/' take the same amount of time after you hit enter then they both must be a single processor instruction or something. In fact, the computer is doing millions of calculations more for the second command, while you sit there picking your nose. That's why I only put one file or subdirectory per directory, so it's simpler for the computer to find it. If a program installs differently, I rewrite it. Since my computer doesn't have to work as hard, it lasts longer. If I did things your way, I might as well pound my motherboard with a shovel. You fucking prick, you disgust me. If someone I knew were putting too many entries directly under root, I'd smash their face with my fist. Asshole.