I may be being pedantic, but AFAIK /sbin stood for 'system-bin' or even 'singleuser-bin'. From 'man hier' HPUX: /sbin Essential system commands. Essential commands are defined as executables that are needed to boot the system and mount the file systems. A full complement of utilities is available only after /usr is mounted. Linux: man hier /sbin Like /bin, this directory holds commands needed to boot the system, but which are usually not executed by normal users. »

Similar concept for Macs http://www.freesmug.org/portableapps »