Refactor storage.conf loading

[dcermak]

I would like to propose that we refactor where & when storage.conf is loaded into the storageOptions structs. Currently it happens in various places, it depends on whether we are using rootless mode or not and most of the value copying from the loaded values into the structs is done by hand on a field by field basis. This leads to subtle bugs that required amendments like #1468 (and ftr, this one is 100% my fault, because I didn't test the changes from #1460 properly).

I would propose that we refactor the config loading, so that it happens in one place only to reduce the cognitive load when dealing with the config loading.

[vrothberg]

SGTM

@rhatdan @giuseppe @nalind WDYT?

[rhatdan]

I think that would be a good idea.

[giuseppe]

I agree, this part of the code is quite messy and hard to follow

[danishprakash]

Looks like there's a consensus on this, I'd like to take a shot at this If that sounds okay.

[neverpanic]

This seems like a good idea, given that there seems to be a bug related to the order in which /etc/containers/storage.conf and /usr/share/containers/storage.conf are processed. See https://bodhi.fedoraproject.org/updates/FEDORA-2023-a0f754c701#comment-2853529.

[Meister1593]

#1587 related

[asteven]

It would be nice to have a /etc/containers/storage.conf.d/ directory for overrides.
Similar structures already exists for e.g for /etc/containers/registries.conf.d.

This makes it so much easier for config management or Dockerfile authors.

Drop a override file in a folder instead of parsing/reading/setting a key:value in a file that changes on every package update.

e.g. my current primary use case:
set driver=zfs in /etc/containers/storage.conf

That's easy to do with config mangement tools like cdist or ansible.
But it's a PITA to do from a Dockerfile.

[rhatdan]

I think this would be a good idea, the issue is no one has stepped forward to do the work.

[danishprakash]

I can start a draft PR and perhaps we can continue this discussion there while consolidating all the ideas shared so far. Wdyt?

[vrothberg]

Thanks, @danishprakash!

I think it's best to first open a separate issue and discuss how this should look like. Designing inside a PR can be very time consuming, especially for those driving the PR.