handling services without linuxconf

[Rusty Carruth]

> 
> What is the best way to manage services without using Linuxconf.  It is my
> understanding that Linuxconf is being phased out in Red Hat, and I've heard
> lots of security-types badmouth it.
> 
> Specifically what I want to be able to do is control whether Samba starts at
> boot, whether Apache does, cron, and so on.

Well, first a VERY quick explanation of how those services get started.

Services get started either via (x)inetd or by script files in
a special directory tree in /etc/rc.d (assuming sysV (I think)
style init).  In rc.d you will find multiple directories, such
as init.d and rc1.d, rc2.d, rc3.d, etc.  When ENTERING runlevel
<n>, all scripts that start with 'S' in rc<n>.d are executed, 
in directory sort order.  When LEAVING runlevel <n>, all scripts
that start with 'K' in rc<n>.d are executed.

Notice that all those scripts in rc<x>.d are softlinks to the
actual scripts over in init.d.

There are 2 ways to disable services started from rc<x>.d -

	1 - rename the script to something besides 'S....'
	2 - delete the script entirely

I prefer option 1.

For things in (x)inetd, see the man page and comment out
or disable the services you don't want.

rc