[arch-dev-public] Replacing common network programs (netkit-*, etc} with GNU inetutils

[Aaron Griffin]

On Sun, Dec 21, 2008 at 5:14 PM, Eric Bélanger
<belanger at astro.umontreal.ca> wrote:
> On Fri, 19 Dec 2008, Eric Bélanger wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 16 Dec 2008, Aaron Griffin wrote:
>>
>> > On Tue, Dec 16, 2008 at 1:58 AM, Eric Bélanger
>> > <belanger at astro.umontreal.ca> wrote:
>> > > On Fri, 12 Dec 2008, Eric Bélanger wrote:
>> > >
>> > >> On Thu, 11 Dec 2008, Aaron Griffin wrote:
>> > >>
>> > >>> On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 2:15 AM, Jan de Groot <jan at jgc.homeip.net> wrote:
>> > >>>>
>> > >>>> On Wed, 2008-12-10 at 18:46 -0500, Eric Bélanger wrote:
>> > >>>>>
>> > >>>>> --enable-tftpd
>> > >>>>> Could replace netkit-tftp (a xinet daemon)
>> > >>>>> Could replace tftp-hpa (a rc.d daemon)
>> > >>>>
>> > >>>> Some broken Intel E100 nics can't netboot from a modern TFTP server that
>> > >>>> includes the blksize extension. I know OpenBSD's tftpd doesn't include
>> > >>>> that extension, and tftp-hpa has an option to disable that extension.
>> > >>>> I would be fine with replacing netkit-tftp, but replacing tftp-hpa is a
>> > >>>> no-go for me.
>> > >>>
>> > >>> Yeah, when this came up, I think I mentioned that "tftp-hpa is needed
>> > >>> for something". I was thinking hardware support... if I remember
>> > >>> right, I think it was the only tftp that could push to my older WRT
>> > >>> router...
>> > >>>
>> > >>>
>> > >>
>> > >> Sure. If we enaable tftp/tftpd in inetutils, it will conflict with
>> > >> tftp-hpa and we might not want that as someone might want to use both
>> > >> packages. We should then disable tftp/tftpd in inetutils and keep tftp-hpa
>> > >> in the repo. As to netkit-tftp, we could either keep it or remove it.
>> > >> Another messier solution would be to enable tftp/tftpd in inetutils but to
>> > >> rename the conflicting files (they would be the tftp client and its man
>> > >> page)
>> > >>
>> > >
>> > > To get this going, I'll summarize. It looks like there is a general
>> > > consensus of adding inetutils to replace some of the current packages
>> > > (no-one objected yet) and to follow points A & B.  So we have:
>> > >
>> > > - enabled:
>> > > ftp/ftpd
>> > > rexecd
>> > > rlogin/rlogind
>> > > rsh/rshd
>> > > rcp
>> > > talk/talkd
>> > > telnet/telnetd
>> > > uucpd
>> > >
>> > > - disabled:
>> > > inetd
>> > > syslogd
>> > > tftp/tftpd
>> > > ping
>> > > ping6
>> > > logger
>> > > whois
>> > > ifconfig
>> > >
>> > > Which means we will remove:
>> > > netkit-ftp
>> > > netkit-rsh
>> > > netkit-telnet
>> > >
>> > > I also think that we should remove netkit-tftp unless it has
>> > > functionnalities that tftp-hpa doesn't. It is orphaned and is less popular
>> > > than tftp-hpa. Usage stats: tftp-hpa=4.15 % and netkit-tftp=1.11 %
>> > >
>> > > I'll start working on a package containing the tools that I listed above as
>> > > enabled. As there's plenty of daemon scripts to write and test, you have a
>> > > good 1-2 weeks to think about it and suggest changes.
>> >
>> > Great. I agree with the netkit-tftp sentiment too. Is it possible to
>> > enable tftp/tftpd in this package, and let tftp-hpa install
>> > side-by-side with it? I haven't looked into it
>> >
>>
>> It would be possible. The conflicting files are:
>> /usr/bin/tftp
>> /usr/share/man/man1/tftp.1.gz
>>
>> We could rename them (e.g., by adding a -gnu suffix) to fix the conflict.
>>
>
> Should we also rename the tftp daemon related files for consistency? Maybe
> a less clumsy solution would be to disable tftp in inetutils but to have a
> seperate inetutils-tftp package. This way users could install inetutils
> with the tftp package of their choice. Any opinion?
>
> BTW, as inetutils doesn't provide the rexec client, I'll add the netkit
> one in the inetutils package. This way all netkit-rsh tools with be
> accounted for.
>
> I'll also disable uucpd. We don't have any client for it in the repo. So
> it make little sense to provide the daemon.  FTR, I tried to get it to
> work by using the uucp package in unsupported but it didn't work. I don't
> know what could be wrong (client, xinitd daemon script or
> wrong config/usage). Anyway , it's in decline[1] and uucpd doesn't
> even have any doc (man or info page) so I gave up. If someone else want to give it a
> try go ahead.
>
> [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UUCP#Decline
>
> All daemon scripts except tftp are ready. They might need some tweaks but
> I can connect to the daemon. Once we agree on wheter we include tftp or
> not, I'll put inetutils in testing.

Hmm, anyone that actually uses tftp care to comment? Last time I used
it was to flash a WRT router, so it was about 5 minutes of usage.