[CentOS-devel] enhancing /etc/*-release

Mon Apr 6 07:02:10 UTC 2015
Bryan Seitz <seitz at bsd-unix.net>


On 4/2/15 3:28 AM, Anders F Björklund wrote:
> Karanbir Singh wrote:
>>> another less-than-optimal solution would be for app developers to
>>> start using lsb_release to find out what distro and release they
>>> are installing onto. of course, that's a different problem, in more
>>> than one way, at least one of which is that lsb_release is not installed
>>> by default.
>>>
>>> I'm switching the app installer for the program I maintain (at work)
>>> to use lsb_release just because it's so much easier than  groping
>>> /etc/redhat-release.
>> have you looked at /etc/os-release ? you can just source it and you get
>> the content needed. I believe most people are trying to drive towards
>> using that ( plus you dont need the lsb dep chain under it then )
>
> Bryan Seitz wrote:
>
>> Team,
>>
>>    I would love to see /etc/os-release added to CentOS5 and CentOS6 as well.  Keep up the good work!
> But os-release is a systemd "feature"*. Seems unlikely to make it ?
> Might as well use `/usr/bin/lsb_release` (and redhat-lsb-core) then.
>
> * http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/os-release.html
>
> Ironically it doesn't even contain the name of the Operating System...
> We saw this when it was introduced in (and broke) PackageKit earlier.
>
> I don't think it's possible to change all redhat-release usage anyway.
Even redhat-lsb-core installs an insane amount of garbage just to get 
that one function we want.  Other distributions (At least Debian/Ubuntu) 
already use /etc/os-release and there is no reason it cannot be 
populated by the centos-release package on C5/C6 as well. It is a good 
idea, the file has useful and standard contents, and it just works.

I am not advocating doing away with the legacy files, but this solution 
just makes sense and is the right thing to do moving forward.