@begin note to debian developers dear debian developers: would someone _please_ explain to marc that, as exim4 is the default mailer for debian, that he is in quite a serious position of responsibility, and that exim4 needs to cater for _everybody_'s needs, with the minimum amount of disruption to existing users, and, i believe, that the addition of 'virtual domains' as described in the article below falls into that category of 'maximum-default-config-beneficial-feature-improvements, zero-impact-on-existing-users'.
in this instance, the addition of the extremely effective and very useful 'virtual domains' concept brings the default debian-provided exim4 feature set more into line with what postfix has provided for _years_. the instructions posted on http://www.debian-administration.org/articles/140 are extremely good: steve kemp's well-written article took me 5 mins to read, 5 to include in my current config, and 5 to test and be happy that it worked. i am therefore appealing to someone else's better nature out there to get this guy marc either replaced or to see sense, or to be guided by somebody _other_ than me. complaints about the word 'virtual' as an excuse are not really acceptable if the default debian mailer's configuration is to move forward. i fully realise when i am disobeying my own guidelines (or, more importantly, i fully recognise a situation where i'm not going to get anywhere with a particular individual's intransigence) about endeavouring to help the most people with the most effective amount of effort (some of you on this list will recall my talk on the sunday morning at the last UKUUG conference) so i am appealing to you, the core debian developers, to step in, and deal with this guy, instead of me. thanks. @end note to debian developers On Fri, Jan 26, 2007 at 10:52:57AM +0100, Marc Haber wrote: > tags #408467 wontfix > thanks > > On Fri, Jan 26, 2007 at 12:50:26AM +0000, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote: > > i've been looking for this for _four years_ for exim, and you _have_ > > to add it in - /etc/aliases is pathetic and annoying, and this > > virtual domains thing is a _significant_ step forward in the usefulness > > of exim4. > > It does, however, move away a lot from the classical paradigm that we > have always been using, and the word "virtual" in a mail context is > heavily overused. with the greatest of respect, i really do have to be quite harsh with you on this one, and say this: tough - get over it. the word 'virtual' is an important concept in computer science, dating back 30 years of _course_ it's going to get used a lot, in a _lot_ more contexts and a lot more many times in those same contexts. i can't imagine the linux kernel developers _ever_ asking people to stop using the word 'virtual' when someone goes and refers to 'virtual memory' as well as 'virtual address'. imagine the chaos that would ensue, and the ridicule that would be heaped onto the person that even _suggested_ such a thing. not least: if you don't _like_ the word 'virtual', then take it up with steve kemp, who wrote the article. > > i seriously considered ripping out a very sophisticated and > > simple-to-set-up arrangement, and replacing it with postfix, _just_ > > because this virtual domains thing took me so long to find. > > If you are that emotional, please go with postfix. whenever i think of postfix, my heart sinks. it takes _days_ to work out what to do: you need to be a serious rocket-scientist to get _anything_ done. by contrast, with exim4, it is absolutely dead-easy to set up, even the most complex arrangements. the longest amount of time is spent tracking things down. a good example is when i needed to do authenticated LMTP TCP redirection: it turned out that you can combine the smtp auth mechanism with the LMTP transport, as, intuitively, might be expected, and dang me if it actually worked! i think i added about 6 lines to some transport config file! took me 30 mins to find the two articles (one about lmtp, the other about smtp auth) to read up about, 5 to combine-edit the configs, and 5 to sit there stunned that it actually worked. > I do not see enough arguments to have this added to the default > configurationn. i am very sorry. i assumed, now incorrectly i see, that it would be obvious that the advantages that this addition brings to exim4 as a useful mail system would be significant. this is my mistake, and i genuinely apologise for not thinking in advance to include any extra details for you to evaluate. > I would be willing to add the configuration snippet as > an example in /usr/share/doc, as long as the word "virtual" is not > used and it is exactly explained what the configuration snippet does. > > I am not going to write these documentation myself though. ahh - are you the guy whom i spoke to some time ago (a couple of years back), about doing some improvements to exim4 config, and you said 'that's too complex for me to cope with'? so - let me get this straight. you want me to cut/paste an authoritative article on debian administration, published on the internet, searcheable and locateable by getting the right keywords, removing the word 'virtual' because _you_ don't don't like the word?? sure - i can do that. s/virtual//g. but i believe that you would be better off talking to steve kemp, the author of the original article, and asking him to do that. l. -- -- lkcl.net - mad free software computer person, visionary and poet. -- -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". 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