Polipo wiki page doesnt make any sense to me, please help?

Question

Im trying to follow the wiki page to set up polipo but this page is completely confusing.
First it says
While other daemons start as root and drop priviledges as soon as possible, polipo runs as the user that invoked it. If polipo is invoked from /etc/rc.d/polipo, change the invokation line from
/usr/bin/$DAEMON $ARGS >/dev/null 2>&1
to
su -c "/usr/bin/$DAEMON $ARGS" -s /bin/sh polipo >/dev/null 2>&1
It is then also necessary to change ownership and/or permissions of several files and directories written by polipo:
* the log file /var/log/polipo. Although a better choice is to create a directory /var/log/polipo owned by the designated user and set polipo's log file to /var/log/polipo/polipo.log via the logFile variable in the config file.
* the pid file at /var/run/polipo/polipo.pid and the directory that hosts it
* the cache directory /var/cache/polipo and all of the contained files
Then a bit further down it says
Polipo can also run without super user privileges. To do so, first copy /etc/polipo/config.sample to a suitable directory:
$ cp /etc/polipo/config.sample ~/.poliporc
Edit it so that it points at a writable location, instead of /var/cache/polipo:
# Uncomment this if you want to put the on-disk cache in a
# non-standard location:
diskCacheRoot = "~/.polipo-cache/"
Create the cache directory:
$ mkdir ~/.polipo-cache
Finally, launch Polipo with the new configuration:
$ polipo -c ~/.poliporc
Im so confused right now. Which one am I supposed to follow?
Last edited by tjwoosta (2011-02-27 23:28:07)

Answer 1

What would you prefer? "tjwoosta sucks" or "tjwoosta seems unfamiliar with the forum etiquette"?
"polipo wiki page sucks" seems pretty damn informative to me, considering that my problem is with the polipo wiki page being confusing.
If I were being childish I would post unhelpful messages in other peoples threads because I have too much time on my hands.
It seems to me that you do not understand  the instructions on the wiki page.
It is, the way I read it, very clear.
You CAN run polipo from /etc/rc.d but it will run as root. However, it is clearly stated that "Polipo should run as an unpriviledged user" (emphasis added by me) and as a consequence you are guided to configure polipo to run as such.
Just to make sure the directions work I set polipo EXACTLY as directed and it works.
I think that if you follow the instructions you will find the same.
It tells you to modify  /etc/rc.d/polipo to run as unprivelaged user polipo. Doesnt that make the second part about configuring as a regular user redundant?
Dont restrict yourself to the Arch wiki - it's good, but not authoritative. Have a look around for other relevant docs, ideally prepared by the polipo devs themselves. Get in touch with other polipo users (on any distro) and seek clarification that way.
When you have found what you are looking for, and successfully set up your polipo install, come back to the wiki and make any necessary changes.
Thanks, I think I will
Last edited by tjwoosta (2011-02-28 00:57:55)