Re: Linux should better cope with power failure

Ben Ford
2001-03-19T23:11:29Z

> Actually, I think /etc/mtab is not needed at all. Originally, UNIX
> used to put as much onto the disk (and not in "core") as possible.
> so much state information related only to one boot-cycle was
> taken out of kernel and stored on disk. /var/run/utmp, /etc/mtab,
> , rmtab, and many others. all are invalidated by a reboot, and are yet
> stored
> in non-volatile storage. kernel memory is not swappable, so they manually
> separated out the minimum needed in core.
>
> Linux currently has a lot of this info in core, and maintains the disk files
> for backwards compatibility. in the case of /etc/mtab, I believe
> /proc/mounts
> has the same info. It appears to be in the same format as /etc/mtab,
> so most of the groundwork has already been done.
> i've considered trying just changing /etc/mtab to /proc/mounts in some
> utilities, to remove the need for read-write root. This (and other cases)
> would guarantee consistency (look at /etc/mtab after restart in single
> user more - ugh)

It has been suggested to ln -sf /proc/mounts /etc/mtab. Linus has said this, I
believe.

-b