The Linux Filesystem Hierarchy Standard says that /var/lib
"holds state information pertaining to an application or the system."
FreeBSD doesn't mention /var/lib
in hier(7)
. The closest thing I can find is /var/db
("miscellaneous automatically generated system-specific database files"), which seems like a more descriptive name.
Where did /var/lib
come from, and how did it get its name? I don't see the connection between /var/lib
and libraries. Or does lib
stand for something else in this case? Is it Linux-specific, or is this a System V vs BSD difference?
Best Answer
The LHFS also says about
/var
as a whole:And this is the link to the past for
/var/lib
: "once" there were files in/usr/lib
that were written - and those now should be put into the/var
structure - to/var/lib
(probably to find them easier if you once were used to look for them in/usr/lib
? )BTW,
/var/db
from BSD is also mentioned in the LHFS, those files are put into/var/lib/misc
in the LHFS.