On Thu, 28 Feb 2008, Ian Jackson wrote:
Timothy G Abbott writes ("Re: Debian Configuration Packaging System"):So, our goal is to provide our users with the same opportunities to override our configuration defaults as they would have had if Debian had been providing them instead. Using the Debian packaging system for this configuration is a good way to achieve this.The Debian packaging system and configuration setups are not designed to provide more than the one level of override for the contents of system files.
Configuration packages made using our system distribute only conffiles. End-users of the configuration packages can modify (e.g.) /etc/ldap/ldap.conf by changing /etc/ldap/ldap.conf.debathena, which is a normal Debian conffile (and is what users will change if they try to modify /etc/ldap/ldap.conf using any editor).
While this may not have been something envisioned by the designers of the Debian packaging system, our system's use of standard pieces of the Debian packaging system certainly supports this.
-Tim Abbott