[Pkg-exim4-users] selecting smarthost based on sender address

[J G Miller]

At 18:56h, on Sunday, May 31, 2015,
in message <20150531165607.GU9568 at torres.zugschlus.de>,
on the subject of "Re: [Pkg-exim4-users] selecting smarthost based on sender address",
Marc Haber wrote -

 > I don't think so. It's fine to simplify things if you know what you're
 > doing.

Okay then ;+)

I do sympathize with the maintainer that with such packages as exim4 with all
the possible models of usage and combination of variables that the maintainer
has a very difficult path the tread of offering something that will "just work"
out of the box for the casual user as well as allowing scope for very individual/site
specific customizations.

The split file format is really good in allowing this.

 > I would, however, suggest only simplifying files that need
 > local changes. That will greatly ease updates and reduce the number of
 > dpkg-conffile questions asked during updates.

Indeed so.  What I do with all the config files (almost all from /etc) is
to create a tree /usr/usr/local/archive/debian/etc and copy all of the original
files which I change there for future reference.

When an update comes around, I can then do a diff (even fldiff for an
easy visual comparison) to see if the file has altered and if so what changes
I need to make to my customized version, and then copy the new official updated
file (dpkg-new) if different to the archive for the next time.
 
 > dc_smarthost is the writing in update-exim4.conf.conf, which gets
 > translated to the exim macro DCsmarthost by update-exim4.conf. So if
 > you directly define the macro inside exim configuration, you need to
 > use DCsmarthost.

Thanks for the explanation - maybe this will help Hans to fix his error.

 > Unfortunately, exim -bV does not check for such errors, so we cannot
 > flag them at daemon start or configuration build time.

Well yes, obviously one would have to write a configuration file syntax
checker which would be a an awful lot of work with a rather low value
to work hours ratio.