Bug#843658: sendmail-cf: Customized sendmail.cf is being overwritten on startup
quoting from /etc/mail/sendmail.conf: # HANDS_OFF="No"; Binary Do *NOT* touch the configuration # Set this *ONLY* if you are going to be fully responsible for the entire # setup of sendmail - the directories, permissions, databases, etc. With # this variable set to "Yes", nothing will be done for you during updates. # # In other words, "The blood be upon your hands" if you set this... # My ability to help with problems will be greatly reduced ! # # "Well, a pet peeve of mine is people who directly edit the # .cf file instead of using the m4 configuration files. # Don't do it! [laughs] I treat the .cf file as a binary # file - you should too." # -- Eric Allman 1999/10/18 # http://www.dotcomeon.com/allman_sendmail_qa.html # HANDS_OFF="No";
Bug#843658: sendmail-cf: Customized sendmail.cf is being overwritten on startup
On 2016-11-08 20:38, Thomas - In:Quality wrote: > That disclaimer is of limited use for people who bring their own > sendmail.cf. ;-) It's a very old and possibly bad habit, but it has not > been a problem for many years, I can easily reproduce your problems in minimal chroots with apt-get install sendmail $EDITOR /etc/mail/sendmail.cf apt-get reinstall sendmail-bin That regenerates sendmail.cf, removing any customization (well, I only tested with comments) while nothing of the *.m4 has changed (but perhaps something gets touched?). But this "works" in wheezy, jessie and stretch, so it probably has worked always in that way. > and I don't even see the point of > rebuilding the file unless there was an update to the m4 stuff. Maybe > "make" can be limited to just the database files for startup? I have no clue how that configuration setup actually works in the Debian package :-( Andreas
Bug#843658: sendmail-cf: Customized sendmail.cf is being overwritten on startup
On 2016-11-08 16:33, Thomas Auge wrote: > in a recent development, updates started overwriting sendmail.cf, now it > seems a rebuild is forced on every startup. It's completely unexpected with > grave implications. Please do not overwrite modified configuration files > without asking. Something that appears prominently at the beginning of sendmail.cf (and that is not a Debian addition): ## # # DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE! Only edit the source .mc file. # ## (The last time I used sendmail (iirc 8.12) in a production environment about 15 years ago I hacked around in sendmail.mc and various *.m4 files, and had a sendmail.cf generated out of these, but never edited sendmail.cf manually) Andreas
Bug#843658: sendmail-cf: Customized sendmail.cf is being overwritten on startup
The SysV init script runs "make all", which rebuilds sendmail.cf. Interestingly it only gets overwritten on about half of our systems, even though there are no obvious differences.
Bug#843658: sendmail-cf: Customized sendmail.cf is being overwritten on startup
Package: sendmail-cf Version: 8.14.4-8+deb8u1 Severity: important Dear Maintainer, in a recent development, updates started overwriting sendmail.cf, now it seems a rebuild is forced on every startup. It's completely unexpected with grave implications. Please do not overwrite modified configuration files without asking. Regards, Thomas
