8.6. Creating Directories

It is time to create some structure in the CLFS file system. Create a standard directory tree by issuing the following commands:

mkdir -pv /{bin,boot,dev,{etc/,}opt,home,lib{,32,64},mnt}
mkdir -pv /{proc,media/{floppy,cdrom},run/{,shm},sbin,srv,sys}
mkdir -pv /var/{lock,log,mail,spool}
mkdir -pv /var/{opt,cache,lib{,32,64}/{misc,locate},local}
install -dv /root -m 0750
install -dv {/var,}/tmp -m 1777
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}{bin,include,lib{,32,64},sbin,src}
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}share/{doc,info,locale,man}
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}share/{misc,terminfo,zoneinfo}
mkdir -pv /usr/{,local/}share/man/man{1..8}
for dir in /usr{,/local}; do
  ln -sv share/{man,doc,info} $dir
done
install -dv /usr/lib/locale
ln -sv ../lib/locale /usr/lib32
ln -sv ../lib/locale /usr/lib64

These entries are needed for the RaQ2 bootloader. Only use these if you are utilizing the Colo bootloader:

cd /boot
ln -svf . boot

Directories are, by default, created with permission mode 755, but this is not desirable for all directories. In the commands above, two changes are made—one to the home directory of user root, and another to the directories for temporary files.

The first mode change ensures that not just anybody can enter the /root directory—the same as a normal user would do with his or her home directory. The second mode change makes sure that any user can write to the /tmp and /var/tmp directories, but cannot remove another user's files from them. The latter is prohibited by the so-called “sticky bit,” the highest bit (1) in the 1777 bit mask.