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Subject: Re: Replacing sendmail
To: jgreco@brasil.moneng.mei.com (Joe Greco)
Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 14:45:47 -0800 (PST)
Cc: jkh@time.cdrom.com, peter@taronga.com, bmk@fta.com,
        jgreco@brasil.moneng.mei.com, brantk@atlas.com, hackers@freebsd.org
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In-Reply-To: <199611262234.QAA17750@brasil.moneng.mei.com> from Joe Greco at "Nov 26, 96 04:34:25 pm"
From: "Brant Katkansky" <bmk@pobox.com>
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> > Not in this particular set of examples, no, but understand that
> > services have many more options *other* than security which you'd also
> > eventually want to fold into the same mechanism.  To contrive more examples:
> > 
> > 	mail_control -fast_queue_depth 10
> > 	mail_control -bounce_warnings no
> > 	mail_control -add-virtual "fred sfred@scurvy.com"
> > 
> > 	lp_control -polled-mode
> > 	lp_control -set-type HP500C
> > 
> > All of which might be reasonable things to want if you were intending
> > to write a more robust front-end for a variety of service options.
> > 
> > Think "big picture", guys. :-)
> 
> That's a nice big picture, I agree, but I am not talking about
> configuration of packages.  That might very WELL be addressed through
> a mechanism like what you are describing!
> 
> I am more interested in the MANAGEMENT of packages, i.e., is a particular
> package available and/or enabled?  That is a higher level ("bigger
> picture" ;-) ) question than configuration particulars.
> 
> CONFIGURATION of packages is a problem as well.  I am not sure that it
> is wise to try to solve both problems with the same tool, but am certainly
> willing to discuss it if you believe that it is (I will tell you now: I have
> a preconceived notion that it is not a good idea).
>

I'm of the same mind as Joe on this, but I don't see it as a problem
to wedge it in elegantly in the future:

pkg_control -config subsystem [opts]

where opts are arguments that are passed to subsystem's config script/program.

-- Brant Katkansky (bmk@pobox.com, brantk@atlas.com)
   Software Engineer, ADC