Re: rebuild world with NO_SENDMAIL=YES

From: Bill Vermillion (bv_at_wjv.com)
Date: 10/29/05 

Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2005 15:35:01 GMT

In article <3sf0f3Fo6dgcU1@individual.net>,
Keve Nagy <see_my_sig@address.invalid> wrote:
>Hi Newsgroup,

>I am considering to replace sendmail with postfix on an existing,
>up-to-date system. It has ports, packages and apps installed (no
>X). My idea is to do a buildworld having "NO_SENDMAIL=YES" in
>/etc/make.conf. Then remove the files left over from sendmail,
>and build postfix from the ports.

You are making a lot of uneccesary work for yourself.

Just install postfix. Then modify the file /etc/mail/mailer.conf
so that anything that calls sendmail calls the appropriate
MTA - in your case postfix.

This is a good approach because if there are any embedded
applications [people who write web pages love to call sendmail
directly] that call sendmail they will use the MTA of your choice.

You don't have to bebuild the OS nor install it, nor do anything
other than make and install postfix and modify the mailer.conf
file.

>My question is: how risky is a buildworld for my existing
>ports/packages and apps?

It won't affect anything.

>Are these expected to remain "relatively untouched" and operational,
>including the ports/pkg database, or is it more likely that the whole
>thing will get out of sync and I have to reinstall all my
>ports/packages/etc ?

You don't have to do a thing with that. And if you notice
virtually all the things in ports are installed in /usr/local
and do not collide with anything in the base system.

And an example of mailer.conf is that if you install sendmail
from the ports tree, it installs under /usr/local and the
mailer.conf can be pointed to the the new version and you just
leave the old version where it is.

>I am under the impression that buildworld and ports/packages
>can be treated relatively separated, so a buildworld should not
>jeopardise the installed ports and packages. Can somebody confirm
>or deny this please!

Correct. I do buildworlds remotely - and only ONE time have I had
to go to the colo - because some IDIOT - had placed something on
the keyboard of the KVM and it hung the system during reboot.

>Also, I noticed some people mentioning a NO_MAILWRAPPER="YES" line
>together with NO_SENDMAIL in make.conf before the buildworld.
>Now I thought that mailwrapper is *required* in order to safely use an
>mta different then sendmail, for staying compatible with as many things
>as possible.
>Is this not required with a biuldworld without sendmail?

I think you are far better of just leaving thigns as they are and
using mailwrapper which uses the /etc/mail/mailer.conf

If you look in the /usr/sbin directory you will find that
/usr/sbin/sendmail is a link to mailwrapper, which uses
mailer.conf, so you can change your MTAs as often as you wish
by changing mailer.conf until you find an MTA that you like.

>One more question: How do I find the orphaned files left from sendmail
>which I want to delete after the buildworld?

You can dig yourself into a hole if you go chasing pieces/parts and
get the wrong things.

>Earlier in another sendmail-2-postfix thread I received suggestions on
>"find . -mtime +1" in some places. This is great on a minimal, clean,
>new system. But this will find other files on a system that already has
>ports and packages installed.

>Any suggestion regarding this?

As above. It works flawlessly and leaves you a way out if anything
goes wrong.

Bill 

-- 
Bill Vermillion - bv @ wjv . com

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