Re: default MTA
On Thu, 30 May 2013 11:11:06 +0200, "Bernhard R. Link"
<brlink@debian.org> wrote:
>* Chris Knadle <Chris.Knadle@coredump.us> [130529 08:29]:
>> - Exim configuration is more human readable than Postifx's, IMHO.
>>
>> Postfix configuration is concise but terse, and there are typically
>> blocks of options separated by commas that doesn't easily allow
>> commenting on specific config options.
>
>Configurability is an important point. Having had to use postfix lately
>I'm quite suprised anyone voluntarily uses that thing. Postfix feels
>like some ad-hoc configuration gone absurd, by only making special use
>cases configuable and then misusing those options for other things.
>Together with this splitting in many little programs which all lack most
>of the information, configuring postfix is a large puzzle and any
>advanced postfix configuration (even from the official documentation)
>looks like McGyver was out of duct-tape but had to build a nuclear reactor
>from kitchen parts with only the transparent tape for office use.
While I don't consider postfix as bad as you describe, I tend to
describe Postfix as the menu in a better restaurant: A relatively
small number of sophisticated dishes which you can choose from, and if
you like them, you will be perfectly satisfied. If you want fries
instead of plain potatoes, you're basically hosed.
Exim, on the other hand, is the fully equipped kitchen with a full
larder and fridge, allowing you to cook exactly what you want, if
you're willing to learn cooking or already bring some cooking
knowledge. This approach might lead to something uneatable, though.
Both solutions have their advantages and disadvantages. People should
be able to choose.
For the default case of an user not knowing what an MTA is, both exim
and postfix are suitable to be the default in Debian. Exim's design is
a bit 1990ies, with a big suid root binary, while Postfix's design is
more modern regarding process structure and privilege separation.
Being biased myself, I'd say not to change a running system and to
keep exim as default. It would be nice to debconfize SMTP auth in the
"exim is the client" case though, as this is a quite common use case.
With my maintainer hat on, Patches are appreciated.
Greetings
Marc
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