[arch-projects] [initscripts][PATCH] arch-sysctl: suppress errors about unknown keys

C Anthony Risinger anthony at xtfx.me
Tue Dec 13 19:23:50 EST 2011


On Tue, Dec 13, 2011 at 2:44 PM, lolilolicon <lolilolicon at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 3:48 AM, Tom Gundersen <teg at jklm.no> wrote:
>> On Tue, Dec 13, 2011 at 8:09 PM, lolilolicon <lolilolicon at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> According to sysctl(8), the -e option is used to "ignore errors about
>>> unknown keys", so no "other error" would be hidden by it.
>>
>> Many reasons for "unknown keys", maybe the module is no longer
>> installed (by mistake), or it failed loading, or, ....
>
> But in case of those failures, one shouldn't expect to look for errors in
> the sysctl error messages in the first place.  Those error messages should
> be supplementary at best.
>
>>
>>> It's a good thing if we can report error on misspelled keys, but only if
>>> we don't report the same errors when the keys are just unknown due to
>>> disabled modules.
>>
>> I can't imagine how that could be done...
>>
>>> Currently I have IPv6 disabled, so I get in boot
>>> messages:
>>>
>>>    error: "net.ipv6.conf.all.use_tempaddr" is an unknown key
>>>    error: "net.ipv6.conf.default.use_tempaddr" is an unknown key
>>
>> To me it makes most sense to disable the sysctl entries if you disable
>> the modules, anything else should give errors.
>
> To me, the sysctl entries are to the modules what configuration files are
> to e.g. daemons -- you don't comment/rename configs if you disable daemons
> in rc.conf.
>
>>
>>> Now if I consistently get these errors, it would be very likely for me to
>>> ignore some other real errors, like misspelling:
>>>
>>>    error: "net.ipv9.conf.default.use_tempaddr" is an unknown key
>>
>> With your patch this error would be ignored anyway...
>
> Yes, but if in either case it will be ignored, better just not print it :P
> My point is that if one gets used to the net.ipv6.* key errors, other real
> errors would more likely be ignored; if instead, we suppress the
> non-critical unknown key errors, the other real errors will stand out.
>
>>
>>> BTW, pre arch-sysctl, it used to be `sysctl -q -p &>/dev/null`, which
>>> really hides *all* errors;
>>
>> Yeah, we are slowly moving away from ignoring errors wherever we can.
>
> I can understand the intent.
>
>>
>>>  in contrast, The -e option sounds far more
>>> reasonable...
>>
>> Sure, but it still risks ignoring some real errors, which is worse
>> than being annoying.
>
> I still think in reality -e is pretty safe; I wonder what the original
> intent for the -e option.
>
> Well, I think I've made my points.  Comparing options, I would add the -e
> to my copy of arch-sysctl, if unfortunately we couldn't agree on this
> matter.

i don't know how beneficial it is to worry about disabled daemons, or
much else related to sysctl ... because imo the whole thing is
busted/outdated, even sysctl.d as implemented by systemd.  in
`/etc/rc.multi`, `arch-sysctl` is called *before* any daemons are
started, so anything added to /proc after that will not be affected
anyway (eg. any modules loaded by daemons et al).

the sad truth is sysctl is not hot-plug friendly at all AFAIK, and
only sysfs attributes (/sys) can be [cleanly] modified by udev rules
...

i know this because i have a desire to disable bridge firewalling on
many of my setups, a /proc/net entry, but the hierarchy doesn't exist
until the bridge modules are loaded ... which, unless explicitly
requested, will almost certainly happen after sysctl stuff has fired.

-- 

C Anthony


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