Re: [Feature Request] UUID in fstab.

["S.P.Zeidler" <spz%NetBSD.org@localhost>]

Thus wrote Utkarsh Anand (utkarsh009%yandex.com@localhost):

> 1. UUIDs are system generated and can be easily assigned during 
> installation, whereas labels are human assigned custom values.

There is no reason whatsoever not to automatically create
useful NAME labels that are also human readable.

> Imagine 
> what would happen if two disks had the same label and the installer 
> placed them in /etc/fstab?

a) You are aware that uuid collisions may be rare but not impossible?
b) In NetBSD, the names of disks are not in fstab, the relevant
   item is the name of the partition.

>  Even if you make the installer show an error,
> it'd be cumbersome to change it midway, during installation.

Why is getting a "you have a name conflict for partition a to be mounted
on /foo and partition b to be mounted on /bar, please rename either"
a problem in the partitioning stage?

> What if they had no 
> label (or a generic one) at all? (Some people are lazy enough to not 
> assign labels and let the computer do the job for them.)

Automatically generating a name from diskname and mount path is trivial,
and likely to be unique enough for one system. (IOW: how many /usr
do you expect to have?)
If that is not random enough for you: picking 4 words out of dict is
still more human friendly than a long hex number.

> 2. A person is much likely to change the Label of a disk than changing 
> the UUID. (Let's say you named your disk PETRA. If you buy another one, 

Let us assume, for a lark, that I was neither an idiot nor
totally new to computers ..

> you might want to rename it as PETRA-1 and call the new one PETRA-2.)

Why would I want to rename the first one?

"We must make everybody suffer under a user-hostile default because
someone MIGHT be an idiot" is a very bad argument for a Unix system.
Unix traditionally has "we don't stop you doing something stupid
because that might stop you doing something smart".

(Also: not trying to be Linux. Linux already exists, there is no need
to create a copy)

> 3. Changing Label is slightly easier than changing UUID.

What's difficult about
(ext) 'tune2fs /dev/sda1 -U random'
(xfs) 'xfs_admin -U $(uuidgen) /dev/sda1'
etc? You need to know what filesystem type it is?

regards,
	spz