What is `/var/metrics` used for?

MichaelK

6/10/23, 8:19 PM

As the title says. It doesn't seem to be part of FHS, and I could not find much in google. I'm wondering which applications write there, on which occasions, and for what purposes.

edit: In response to the comments: I am seeing it on a fresh install of Kubutnu 20.04, while inspecting it from another Linux. I haven't booted it yet. It is listed as drwxrwsrwt 2 root avahi-autoipd and is empty at the moment.

~~I'll run the diagnostics when I boot it, and will update.~~

Update:

From inside the system, it's listed as drwxrwsrwt 2 root whoopsie.
sudo dpkg -S /var/metrics doesn't find anything.
sudo lsof +D /var/metrics returns empty.
sudo find /var/metrics -print0 | xargs -0 --no-run-if-empty file returns /var/metrics: setgid, sticky, directory and nothing else. The folder is empty.

Doesn't look like it's being used yet on my system. It's just there.

0 + 0

filesystem

Andrew Lowther

6/10/23, 10:36 PM

On minimal stock Ubuntu Bionic and Focal servers I do not have a `/var/metrics` directory. What is the output on your system of `dpkg -S /var/metrics`? Is there anything in the directory?

waltinator

6/10/23, 10:50 PM

In addition to `dpkg -S /var/metrics`, see if it's in use at the monent: `sudo lsof +D /var/metrics`.

waltinator

6/10/23, 10:52 PM

And `sudo find /var/metrics -print0 | xargs -0 --no-run-if-empty file`.

Terrance

6/11/23, 3:49 AM

https://www.linux.org/threads/temporary-files.10817/ *"/var/metrics/ or /var/usermetrics/ contains various numerical data"*. I honestly don't think that you're going to find much data about the folder(s) as they might be used for compatibility.

MichaelK

6/11/23, 11:58 AM

@Terrance That's the only info I could find on that, but it's very vague.

Terrance

6/11/23, 2:14 PM

Like the title in the link I shared, it is with the temporary files in Linux. Like the folder location says `/var` meaning variable as being for temporary usage like `/tmp`. As the system may need `metrics` for numbers temporary storage, that is where it is going to store that data for the time being. If I were to guess that it is probably there for when you use `metric` like in networking. Everything in Linux is a file and needs to go somewhere, so it will probably go to the `/var/metrics` folder for the time being until it is no longer in use.