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Full Discussion: Clueless re Java: /opt vs. /usr/local
Operating Systems Linux Fedora Clueless re Java: /opt vs. /usr/local Post 302879786 by bakunin on Sunday 15th of December 2013 10:16:04 AM
Old 12-15-2013
The debate about "/opt" versus "/usr/local" boils down to the following:

In Unix the layout of the filesystem is more or less fixed. Every file, executable or not, should have its designated place where it has to go. This only as an afore.

The Linux initiative came up with an attempt to further codify this already long-used "best practice" and published the "Filesystem Hierarchy Standard".

I won't comment on the other parts of the document, just the part dealing with "/usr/local" and "/opt":

"/opt" is where all application should go. For every application there should be a subdirectory with its name (and optionally manufacturer) and in that a directory with its version. The "foo" application of the "bar" company in version 1.23 would go to "/opt/bar/foo/1.23", for instance. The executables for this software should be in "/opt/bar/foo/1.23/bin" with optional links to "/opt/bin" to avoid a convoluted PATH.

"/usr/local" is the place for all the OS extensions the administrator wants to have at this particular system. As "/usr" (short for "Unix Software Resources") is under the sole discretion of the OS provider this is the only place that should be modifyable by the SysAdmin. Still, this should be limited to OS-relevant utilities, not for applications in their own right. You might place a third-party "ssh"-client there or "gzip", but not, for instance, "MySQL".

Having said that: if you put java into "/usr/local" or into "/opt" is a question of if you see it as an application in its own right or merely a system tool. There is no "correct" answer to that, just your sensible decision about what best describes its usage on your system.

I hope this helps.

bakunin
 

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LEARN ABOUT SUNOS

libcspi.3

libcspi.3(3)						 Introduction to Library Functions					      libcspi.3(3)

NAME

       at-spi, libcspi - Assistive Technology Service Provider Interface, and AT-SPI C Bindings

DESCRIPTION

       at-spi  is the Assistive Technology Service Provider Interface, which provides a set of client-side APIs for use by assistive technologies.
       Assistive Technologies are augmentative or adaptive technologies that make the desktop user interface accessible to persons with  disabili-
       ties.

       These APIs for assistive technology developers are available in two forms.

       at-spi is defined by CORBA IDL in the following files:

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Accessible.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Action.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Application.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Component.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Desktop.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_EditableText.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Event.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Hyperlink.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Hypertext.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Image.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Registry.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Relation.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Role.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Selection.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_State.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_StreamableContent.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Table.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Text.idl

       /usr/share/gnome/idl/at-spi-1.0/Accessibility_Value.idl

       An  AT-SPI  client can use any programming language for which general CORBA language bindings are available (for example, Java, C, C++) and
       may use any CORBA 2.2-compliant ORB. The client bindings are generated from the above IDL by a language-specific IDL compiler which is usu-
       ally bundled with ORBs. The GNOME 2 environment includes an efficient ORB with C bindings (ORBit2).

       libcspi AT-SPI clients may also use the C language bindings that are defined in libcspi and documented in the developer documentation.

       To access the developer documentation, you must install the developer version of the package.

       Such  clients may also link to libcspi, which provides CORBA server-side implementations of the Accessibility::EventLister interfaces which
       are used for AT-SPI event notification support.

FILES

       The following files are used by this application:

       /usr/lib/libcspi.so     AT-SPI C Binding shared library

       /usr/share/gtk-doc/html Location of developer documentation

ATTRIBUTES

       See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:

       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |      ATTRIBUTE TYPE	     |	    ATTRIBUTE VALUE	   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Availability		     |SUNWgnome-a11y-libs	   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Interface stability	     |External			   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+

SEE ALSO

       libatk-1.0(3)

NOTES

       Written by Brian Cameron, Sun Microsystems Inc., 2003, 2004.

SunOS 5.10							    31 Aug 2004 						      libcspi.3(3)
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