Subject: install: please add an --atomic option

From: Marcin Owsiany <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 10 Aug 2005 20:51:18 +0200

Package: coreutils
Version: 5.2.1-2
Severity: wishlist
Tags: upstream

Please add an --atomic option, which would make install create a
temporary file in destination directory, copy the data into it,
chmod/chown it as appropriate and then rename() to destination name.

This obviously should not be the default, since the destination
directory is not guaranteed to be writable.

Current behavior may cause problems when other program tries to open
the file while it is being installed. It does for me, I use install to
update a blacklist from a cronjob, and exim sometimes tries to open the
file before it is chmod-ed, causing deferrals.

regards,

Marcin

-- System Information:
Debian Release: testing/unstable
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell:  /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.11-1-k7
Locale: LANG=pl_PL, LC_CTYPE=pl_PL (charmap=ISO-8859-2)

Versions of packages coreutils depends on:
ii  libacl1                     2.2.29-1.0.1 Access control list shared library
ii  libc6                       2.3.2.ds1-22 GNU C Library: Shared libraries an

coreutils recommends no packages.

-- no debconf information