[Bug libc/16142] New: Supporting /usr/lib/passwd

["walters at verbum dot org" <sourceware-bugzilla at sourceware dot org>]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=16142

            Bug ID: 16142
           Summary: Supporting /usr/lib/passwd
           Product: glibc
           Version: unspecified
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: libc
          Assignee: unassigned at sourceware dot org
          Reporter: walters at verbum dot org
                CC: drepper.fsp at gmail dot com

Historically on Unix, /etc/passwd has been the "default" backend for user data,
and this is implemented by glibc's "files" backend.

However, as part of the https://live.gnome.org/OSTree project, I am trying to
create a stronger separation between the operating system defaults, and
per-machine configuration.

As used by both mainstream package systems like Debian (dpkg) and Red Hat
Enterprise Linux (rpm), the way the system works is that post-install scripts
run "useradd" or equivalent, which dynamically adds system users to
/etc/passwd.

The problem is that this file also contains users added interactively by the
system administrator, which means that it requires special merge logic.

If instead glibc supported /usr/lib/passwd, then these package systems (and
systems using OSTree) could put system password data there.

The key advantage of this is it's much more clear who "owns" the data. 
/usr/lib/passwd is owned by dpkg/rpm, in the same way /usr/bin/bash is.

The driving rationale for me is that OSTree demands very clear semantics for
the 3 directories of /etc, /usr, and /var.  It will do an automatic basic 3 way
merge for /etc, and this works well for the vast majority of files there on
modern systems - /etc/passwd is the major exception.

(This all appies for /etc/group of course too).

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