Les Mikesell wrote: > Mikkel L. Ellertson wrote: > >>>> It is also reasonable for a machine to only need to deliver locally >>>> generated mail. >>> It wouldn't be much fun if all machines did that. >>> >> But that doesn't change the fact that it is reasonable for some >> machines. Or are you saying that because some machines need to >> receive mail from the outside, that by default all machines should >> be configured to receive outside mail? > > I'm saying that because we know some machines will need to accept > network email - or it won't work for anyone - a general purpose > distribution should make that as easy to set up as any other service. > How much harder is it to configure Sendmail then Apache? If you can read the included sendmail.mc file, it has examples of what you need, and tells you that you need the sendmail-cf package, and tells you to run "make -C /etc/mail". I guess it should tell you that you also need the Make package... If your complaint is that there isn't a GUI to do the configuration, all I can say is that I don't want one. If enough people say that they do want one, then maybe one will get written. Or you can buy one from sendmail.com. >> Why should my laptop accept >> incoming mail when it does not have a valid domain name, or a fixed >> IP address? > > Why should any option you don't need this minute be there? Why should > the distribution work on more than laptops? Why single out sendmail here? > >> It would be interesting to what percentage of machines running Linux >> actually need to be configured to accept incoming mail connections >> from the outside. > > Why is that more interesting than the percentage that have SATA drives? > Or any other thing that a general-purpose distro should handle but not > everyone wants? > Because we are talking about how Sendmail should be configure by default, and not what is provided. If you want to make a valid analogy, it would be that SATA drivers should be compiled into the kernel by default, instead of being modules because some people need them. This is what you are arguing - that the default should be the way you want it. > > Most machines don't need most of the features of the kernel. That > doesn't mean some arbitrary set should be broken - or that you should > have to edit obscure configurations and rebuild for fairly common > operations. > No, but it does not mean that every feature should be compiled in by default. That is why we have modules. The people that need support for hardware A load the modules for hardware A. If you do not need the support for hardware A, then you do not load the module. If you need to accept incoming mail connections, you configure Sendmail to accept them. Your insisting that the default configuration accept incoming mail connections is like saying that because you have hardware A, that support for hardware A needs to be compiled into the kernel. Have you even looked at the default sendmail.mc file? Or do you mean that sendmail.mc is an obscure configuration file? Because the line you need to change sure isn't obscure in the file. I guess that if you do not read the options in the file, then you can miss it. But if you do not read the options in the file, are you going to get a properly working configuration? Mikkel -- Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for thou art crunchy and taste good with Ketchup!
