[Info-vax] Changing SMTP server presented hostname in UCX

[Bill Gunshannon]

In article <lumsjt$if5$1 at dont-email.me>,
	Stephen Hoffman <seaohveh at hoffmanlabs.invalid> writes:
> On 2014-09-09 11:03:36 +0000, Simon Clubley said:
> 
>> If VSI want to sell systems to new non-existing VMS customers, it's
>> going to have to produce something a lot better than this current
>> mess. You should not have to shut everything down and reboot the
>> system just to update the TCP/IP hostname (which is clearly what
>> the intended usage model here is.)
> 
> One of many such areas.
> You've only scratched the surface of changing a hostname.
> There are packages where it's faster to reinstall the package than to 
> get it to change host names.
> IMO, hand-edited configuration text files aren't the way forward for 
> system and network configurations, either.
 
I have heard this (and seen it done) from many corners but I certainly
don't agree.  Sometimes you just want to change something simple and
having to redo the whole mess just seems like a lot of wasted time.
And, when things go wrong and a human has to fix it it is a lot easier
if they can actually see and understand what they are dealing with and
not the way some config program is interpreting it.  I would love to
know just what the supposed advantage of binary configs over human
readable ones is.  Unless it is an attempt at obscuring data to protect
ones job.  Sometime abstraction is a good idea, but not always.

bill

-- 
Bill Gunshannon          |  de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n.  Three wolves
billg999 at cs.scranton.edu |  and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
University of Scranton   |
Scranton, Pennsylvania   |         #include <std.disclaimer.h>