Why .local/share ?

[Rodney Dawes]

On Mon, 2008-11-10 at 11:30 +0100, Thiago Macieira wrote:
> Orion White wrote:
> >Hi--
> >
> >I've begun to use the XDG base directory standard for my projects, and I
> >am very happy with it.
> >
> >However, I do not understand the rational behind .local/share. I have
> >searched the Internet for some explanation, but to no avail.
> >
> >Why is .local/share not just .local/ or .share/? Why the two levels? And
> >what is supposed to go in .local/ other than share/?
> 
> Think of .local/lib, .local/bin, .local/libexec or .local/include. Also 
> note that many systems already append "share" to their prefixes (/usr, 
> /usr/local), so it was probably easier to reuse the code.

Then why ".config" instead of ".local/etc" and ".cache" instead of
".local/var/cache"? Shouldn't these directories be under .local as
well? And shouldn't we define XDG_FOO_HOME variables for the other
paths? I think an $XDG_LIB_HOME would be particularly useful for
apps who wish to allow plug-ins to be installed in the user's home
directory.

-- Rodney