I believe historically /etc/os-release has been a real file, but other distros have switched to shipping /usr/lib/os-release with a symlink from /etc/os-release. This is how Arch, Fedora, and RHEL work at least. E.g., the change was made for RHEL in https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1766754 These files are described in man 5 os-release (https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/os-release.html) which says > /usr/lib/os-release is the recommended place to store OS release information as part of vendor trees. /etc/os-release should be a relative symlink to /usr/lib/os-release, to provide compatibility with applications only looking at /etc.
The bug has been closed via the following commit(s): https://gitweb.gentoo.org/repo/gentoo.git/commit/?id=892dfe550af8c3d7c033b68408275582edf6504e commit 892dfe550af8c3d7c033b68408275582edf6504e Author: William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> AuthorDate: 2020-11-14 17:01:45 +0000 Commit: William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> CommitDate: 2020-11-14 17:07:24 +0000 sys-apps/baselayout: 2.7-r1 bump Closes: https://bugs.gentoo.org/732142 Signed-off-by: William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> sys-apps/baselayout/baselayout-2.7-r1.ebuild | 317 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 317 insertions(+)
