ME revision 43808
1
2When templating, /conf/ME is typically a softlink to
3/conf/<appropriate-machine>.  When doing a diskless boot, /conf/ME is
4retargeted by /etc/rc.diskless1 from pointing to the server to pointing
5to the client's directory, /conf/<ip-address-of-client>.  The retargeting
6is accomplished through an MFS -o union mount.
7
8When templating, this softlink should be different for each machine.
9When doing a diskless boot, this softlink is typically part of the / NFS
10mount from the server and points to the server's conf directory, but gets
11retargeted during the /etc/rc.diskless1 phase.
12
13System-wide configuration files must generally be targeted through /conf/ME.
14For example, your /etc/rc.conf.local should become a softlink to
15/conf/ME/rc.conf.local and your real rc.conf.local should go into the 
16appropriate /conf/<appropriate-machine> directory.  This is also true of
17/etc/rc.local, /etc/fstab, /etc/syslog.conf, /etc/ccd.conf, /etc/ipfw.conf,
18/etc/motd, /etc/resolv.conf, and possibly even /etc/ttys ( if you want
19to start an X session up on boot on certain of your machines ).
20
21When templating, you duplicate your / and /usr partitions on each machine's
22local disk from a single master ( assuming /var and /home reside elsewhere ),
23EXCEPT for the /conf/ME softlink.  The /conf/ME softlink is the only thing
24on / that should be different for each machine.
25
26There are often categories of configuration files.  For example, all of your
27shell machines may use one resolv.conf while all of your mail proxies may
28use another.  Configuration files can be categorized fairly easily through
29/conf/HT.<category> directories.  You put the actual configuration file in
30/conf/HT.<category> and make a softlink from
31/conf/ME/<appropriate-machines>/config-file to "../HT.<category/config-file".
32This means that access to these files tends to run through more then one
33softlink.  The advantage is that for all the complexity of your /conf
34directory hierarchy, most of your common config files exist in only one place
35in reality.
36
37
38