Subject: bug#35417: closed (Re: Tor Service)

From: Julien Lepiller <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2019 11:59:39 +0200

Le 25 avril 2019 11:24:27 GMT+02:00, Raghav Gururajan <[email-masked]> a écrit :
>In continuation to my previous email in this thread:
>
>For example, service "openssh-service-type" uses the package "openssh"
>and the latter shows up in
>my system packages list. But the doubt is; why service
>"tor-service-type" which uses the package
>"tor", doesn't show up in the system packages list??
>
>April 25, 2019 5:10 AM, "Raghav Gururajan" <[email-masked]> wrote:
>
>> DOUBT!
>> 
>> I found the following in the guide:
>> 
>> Data Type: tor-configuration
>> tor (default: tor)
>> The package that provides the Tor daemon. This package is expected to
>provide the daemon at bin/tor
>> relative to its output directory. The default package is the Tor
>Project’s implementation.
>> 
>> So the package "tor" actually used when using the service
>"tor-service-type". Then why the package
>> "tor" isn't added to the system as it is not showing up in the system
>packages list?
>> 
>> April 24, 2019 11:42 PM, "Raghav Gururajan" <[email-masked]> wrote:
>> 
>>> Ah! My bad. I thought only Tor commands can be used to administrate
>tor service. Didn't know Nyx,
>>> herd and emacs torrc can be used to administrate tor service. All
>cool. :)
>>> 
>>> April 24, 2019 2:54 PM, [email-masked] wrote:
>> 
>> Your bug report
>> 
>> #35417: Tor Service
>> 
>> which was filed against the guix package, has been closed.
>> 
>> The explanation is attached below, along with your original report.
>> If you require more details, please reply to [email-masked].
>> 
>> --
>> 35417: http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=35417
>> GNU Bug Tracking System
>> Contact [email-masked] with problems

That's because the cor service needs to run the tor binaryto do something useful. The tor field gives it access to the store path to the tor package, so it can start tor. So the tor package is present somewhere in the store and the service knows how to use it. Generally, users of tor do not need direct access to the tor binary, so it's not installed in a profile, only kept in the store. Openssh service users however are usually users of the openssh client, so it is also added  to the system profile.