Unix/Linux中/usr目录的由来

在Linux系统中，有一个很重要的目录——/usr目录。关于这个目录名称的由来，网上主要有下面几种说法：

user的缩写
User Shareable Read-only的缩写
Unix/User System Resources的缩写
Unix/User Software Resources的缩写

目前大多数版本的Linux中/usr目录主要放置的是可执行文件和先关库文件，因此user好像不太可能。
查阅了相关的资料，关于/usr目录起源的说法如下：

/usr usually contains by far the largest share of data on a system.
Hence, this is one of the most important directories in the system as
it contains all the user binaries, their documentation, libraries,
header files, etc…. X and its supporting libraries can be found
here. User programs like telnet, ftp, etc…. are also placed here. In
the original Unix implementations, /usr was where the home directories
of the users were placed (that is to say, /usr/someone was then the
directory now known as /home/someone). In current Unices, /usr is
where user-land programs and data (as opposed to ‘system land’
programs and data) are. **The name hasn’t changed, but it’s meaning has
narrowed and lengthened from “everything user related” to “user usable
programs and data”.** As such, some people may now refer to this
directory as meaning ‘User System Resources’ and not ‘user’ as was
originally intended.
/usr is shareable, read-only data. That means that /usr should be
shareable between various FHS-compliant hosts and must not be written
to. Any information that is host-specific or varies with time is
stored elsewhere.
Large software packages must not use a direct subdirectory under the
/usr hierarchy.

/usr目录存放了系统中重要的二进制文件，文档，库文件，头文件等等。在早起的Unix版本中，/usr目录是作为用户的家目录而存在的（相当于现在的/home目录），因此这个目录的名字最开始应该是user的缩写，表示用户的家目录。而现在的Unix版本中，/usr目录的作用已经大不相同了，主要存放的是一些非系统启动必要的程序和数据。因此一些人把/usr目录的含义引申为User System Resources.

/usr目录存放共享的，只读的数据。这意味着/usr应该是可以在兼容FHS标准的主机间共享的，并且其中的数据是不应该被修改的。那些与主机属性相关或者经常变动的数据不应该存放在次目录。

大型的软件包不要使用/usr下的子目录存放。

由此以来，/usr目录的由来就真相大白了。你可以称之为User System Resources或者User Shareable Read-only. Whatever, 了解它的历史和作用就好。

转载https://segmentfault.com/a/1190000000497217