Date: Wed, 20 Jun 2007 23:19:18 +0200 From: Alban Hertroys <dalroi@solfertje.student.utwente.nl> To: Jo Rhett <jrhett@svcolo.com> Cc: Kurt Buff <kurt.buff@gmail.com>, freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Subject: Re: how much beer do I need to get this patch applied? Message-ID: <A456B7C4-6028-4DD5-9874-80918424488A@solfertje.student.utwente.nl> In-Reply-To: <44A91A3E-96EA-46F3-ABE4-01C4662B5A5F@svcolo.com> References: <E745210E-A5B8-48E0-B6A8-A467F1054BD7@svcolo.com> <20070620151306.GM45993@therub.org> <20070620115023971992.49dc4616@kjsl.com> <20070620164749.GN45993@therub.org> <a9f4a3860706201040u1f7e89eane68a7588cd017b96@mail.gmail.com> <44A91A3E-96EA-46F3-ABE4-01C4662B5A5F@svcolo.com>
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On Jun 20, 2007, at 21:43, Jo Rhett wrote: > On Jun 20, 2007, at 10:40 AM, Kurt Buff wrote: >> Indeed, which is why this patch might not be such a good idea. In >> this >> case, absence of evidence is indeed evidence of absence, which is >> contrary to the general case. > > You appear to be completely confused about what this change does. > All it does is TO ALLOW (not require) the OP to disable the > spurious and empty output from successful cron jobs. > > If I get a message every day saying "No output", how do I know when > a failure has occurred? This patch changes nothing about that > behavior. Getting no message is equally useless in the situation > where no output was generated *AND* the result code is positive. > > The more likely is that the OP starts deleting the messages unread > each day and thus never sees an actual failure report. You obviously both make a good point. You don't want to get flooded by messages saying that everything is all right, but you do want to know when not every machine is able to send such a message. Would it help if "everything is all right"-mails would be easily discerned from messages saying "there is a problem"? IMHO that way you could move the "everything is all right" messages into a separate mailbox which would serve as a coarse check (there'd be about the same amount of new messages in it every day), while the "there's a problem" mails would still stick out like a soar thumb. I don't know how hard this would be, it'd probably be more work than the suggested patch. My 2 cents. -- Alban Hertroys "This person has performed an illegal operation, and will be shot down." !DSPAM:74,4679997c10034581612333!
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