The original filesystem hierarchy was designed when 1MB was a large amount of space.<p>If you want to have a separate read-only partition for system programs (and require going into single-user mode to modify that), go for it.  But the rest of the &#x2F;bin &#x2F;etc &#x2F;usr &#x2F;usr&#x2F;local nonsense is just because it&#x27;s easier than changing to something better for most people.