Introduction
Purpose
This standard enables:
Software to predict the location of installed files and
directories, and
Users to predict the location of installed files and
directories.
We do this by:
Specifying guiding principles for each area of the filesystem,
Specifying the minimum files and directories required,
Enumerating exceptions to the principles, and
Enumerating specific cases where there has been historical conflict.
The FHS document is used by:
Independent software suppliers to create applications which are FHS
compliant, and work with distributions which are FHS compliant,
OS creators to provide systems which are FHS compliant, and
Users to understand and maintain the FHS compliance of a system.
The FHS document has a limited scope:
Local placement of local files is a local issue, so FHS does not
attempt to usurp system administrators.
FHS addresses issues where file placements need to be coordinated
between multiple parties such as local sites, distributions,
applications, documentation, etc.
Conventions
We recommend that you read a typeset version of this document rather
than the plain text version. In the typeset version, the names of files
and directories are displayed in a constant-width font.
Components of filenames that vary are represented by a description
of the contents enclosed in "<" and
">" characters,
<thus>. Electronic mail addresses are also
enclosed in "<" and ">" but are shown in the usual
typeface.
Optional components of filenames are enclosed in
"[" and "]" characters and may
be combined with the "<" and
">" convention. For example, if a filename is
allowed to occur either with or without an extension, it might be
represented by
<filename>[.<extension>].
Variable substrings of directory names and filenames are indicated
by "*".
The sections of the text marked as
Rationale are explanatory and are
non-normative.