The List has returned!

[Frank Wiles]

On Thu, 31 Jul 2003 15:43:14 -0500
Garrett Goebel <garrett at scriptpro.com> wrote:

> Let me buy you a cup of coffee then... Its hardly sporting to "tire"
> at the initial responses to the security issues you raised.

  Oh I didn't mean your post.  It's just that this argument seems to
  popup ever 6 months on some list or another that I'm on. 
 
> > Yes you are right qmail has had zero.  Personally, I do not see
> > that as a reason to switch.
> 
> Your prerogative. Sendmail has a track record of security flaws. Qmail
> does not. An "old argument" as you put it. Its widely accepted that it
> is a Herculean task to graft security into code that wasn't
> architected or implemented with it in mind. I don't foresee Sendmail
> security issues as ever becoming a permanent thing of the past.
> 
> I for one like that qmail is simple, small, and fairly straight
> forward to configure. The learning curve for me was much steeper on
> Sendmail. But of course, qmail's learning curve is no reason to
> "switch" if you already know sendmail. Then again, who knows Sendmail?
> Fairly unscientific, but using the page lengths of the definitive
> books: 3rd edition O'Reilly Sendmail is what? 1200+ pages whereas
> "Life with Qmail" is <500.

  O'Reilly's Sendmail book has about 100 useful pages for the 
  average admin.  I run pretty large Sendmail installations and have
  never needed to code up my own Sendmail rule for instance.  I think
  people get scared off because of how big the book is, when in all
  honestly it's more like an Unabridged dictionary of possibilities
  and not "You need to read ever page to understand sendmail"

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   Frank Wiles <frank at wiles.org>
   http://frank.wiles.org
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