Proposed Unification of /usr/bin and /usr/sbin in Fedora 40
In the release of Fedora 40, it has been proposed to combine the contents of the /usr/bin and /usr/sbin directories. The plan is to replace the /usr/sbin directory with a symbolic link pointing to /usr/bin. A similar transformation was previously made in Fedora 17, where /bin and /sbin were converted into symbolic links to /usr/bin and /usr/sbin. The aim of this change is to concentrate all executable files in one place and remove the mention of /usr/sbin from the Path environment variable. However, it is important to note that this proposal is currently in the discussion stage and has not been considered by the Fedora Engineering Steering Committee (Fesco), which is responsible for the technical aspects of the Fedora Distribution. (Source: Fedora Project)
Background
The separation of executable files into the /bin and /sbin directories has been an outdated practice that has lost its relevance in modern distributions. Initially, it was believed that /sbin housed the most important executable files that were statically compiled and suitable for use in recovery mode or in case of inaccessibility to the /usr section. However, in Fedora, the contents of /sbin have not been statically compiled for a long time, and the files are actually placed in the /usr section rather than the root section. (Source: Fedora Project)
Furthermore, the separation of programs into /sbin and /bin was used to differentiate between administrator programs and programs for ordinary users. However, the criteria for placing programs in these directories are not well-defined and for many years, most distributions have included both /usr/bin and /usr/sbin in the PATH variable for all users. This means that the separation between /bin and /sbin has not been effective for a long time and only causes confusion when an absolute path to an executable file needs to be used, especially when different distributions organize executable files differently based on /bin and /sbin directories. (Source: Fedora Project