Bug 2216793

Summary:	systemd should create and own .conf.d directories
Product:	Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8	Reporter:	Orion Poplawski <orion>
Component:	systemd	Assignee:	systemd maint <systemd-maint>
Status:	NEW ---	QA Contact:	Frantisek Sumsal <fsumsal>
Severity:	low	Docs Contact:
Priority:	unspecified
Version:	8.8	CC:	dtardon, systemd-maint-list
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OS:	Linux
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Description Orion Poplawski 2023-06-22 15:24:19 UTC

Description of problem:

man systemd-system.conf mentions:

/etc/systemd/system.conf.d and /usr/lib/systemd/system.conf.d
/etc/systemd/user.conf.d and /usr/lib/systemd/user.conf.d

systemd should create and own these directories.

Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable):
systemd-239-74.el8_8.x86_64

$ rpm -qf /etc/systemd/system.conf.d  /usr/lib/systemd/system.conf.d /etc/systemd/user.conf.d /usr/lib/systemd/user.conf.d
file /etc/systemd/system.conf.d is not owned by any package
error: file /usr/lib/systemd/system.conf.d: No such file or directory
error: file /etc/systemd/user.conf.d: No such file or directory
error: file /usr/lib/systemd/user.conf.d: No such file or directory

Comment 1 David Tardon 2023-06-26 07:54:21 UTC

(In reply to Orion Poplawski from comment #0)
> man systemd-system.conf mentions:
> 
> /etc/systemd/system.conf.d and /usr/lib/systemd/system.conf.d
> /etc/systemd/user.conf.d and /usr/lib/systemd/user.conf.d
> 
> systemd should create

No, it shouldn't. They are not needed until someone--either an admin or another package--needs to place a config. override there. Creating them unconditionally just adds needless clutter.

> and own these directories.

Yes, it probably should. But why limit it to just these config. dirs? Every systemd binary that does have a config. file (e.g., systemd-journald or systemd-coredump) reads respective config. dirs too.

Comment 2 Orion Poplawski 2023-07-16 03:20:27 UTC

I have found that the presence of various *.d directories in /etc is a very good indication that it is possible to use them.  Many packages create empty dirs as a guide to admins.  But I can see the opposite view as well.