Hi Vincent, On Tue, Mar 29, 2005 at 11:52:16PM +0200, Vincent Lefevre wrote: > On 2005-03-29 22:49:13 +0200, Marc Haber wrote: > > On Tue, Mar 29, 2005 at 09:46:18PM +0200, Vincent Lefevre wrote: > > > BTW, /etc/exim4/update-exim4.conf.conf says: > > > > > > # Edit this file and /etc/mailname by hand and execute update-exim4.conf > > > # yourself or use 'dpkg-reconfigure exim4-config' > > > > > > so the user may think that he has the full control of this file, > > > > He has, but it is generated by debconf. Debconf reads in the file > > and takes the values from there during reconfiguration of the package, > > and some changes by the user may be overwritten by a reconfiguration > of the package. Usually not. The code handling update-exim4.conf.conf carefully reads in the settings before changes. Our current issue is the other way round: update-exim4.conf.conf correctly fixed up your configuration file, preserving all local changes that it was able to see. And you overwrote the fixed code with the output of your m4 script. I don't see what the exim4 configuration can do here. I mean, for our code this looks like "ok, we fixed dc_other_hostnames once, but the local admin decided that he didn't like our change and undid it. Oh well." Actually, what you did was a local change, and we are bound to respect that one. We changed our default behavior, and adapted the configuration in a way that doesn't change overall behavior. Your code undid our configuration adaption, resulting in the application behaving according to the new default. > > but having multiple versions of the file replacing each other > > depending on environment is pretty exotic. > > It's pretty common for those who use netenv. But done wrong. > > I don't see what the exim4 packages can do within reasonable bounds > > regarding to this particular problem without leaving a gazillion of > > other possible error cases unhandled. > > Comments should be clear about who can modify the files and how. Anybody can modify update-exim4.conf.conf, and changes done locally are respected. And you have proven that this works. > If you want other examples, /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 begins with: > > ### BEGIN DEBCONF SECTION > # XF86Config-4 (XFree86 server configuration file) generated by dexconf, the > # Debian X Configuration tool, using values from the debconf database. > # > # Edit this file with caution, and see the XF86Config-4 manual page. > # (Type "man XF86Config-4" at the shell prompt.) > # > # If you want your changes to this file preserved by dexconf, only make changes > # before the "### BEGIN DEBCONF SECTION" line above, and/or after the > # "### END DEBCONF SECTION" line below. This is much worse than what we do: dexconf unconditionally overwrites what is in between the BEGIN and END line while we respect all local changes. > and /etc/fonts/fonts.conf begins with: > >