Tim:
On Wed, 2012-05-30 at 23:14 +0200, Mateusz Marzantowicz wrote:
> I really don't know why a regular desktop user
> is forced to have such infrastructure installed and operational out of
> the box only to allow some poorly designed programs to pass messages
> to
> the user. I think it's one of that old UNIX approaches that need to be
> revised and changed to better suite desktop Linux users.
What? One that works well, needs replacing with something new, to bring
about a new set of problems?
Only because something works well, doesn't mean it
is the best choice
for everyone and forever. It always could have been better.
What alternative do you think would be better to pass log messages
onto
the user(s)? It has to be something that works when the user isn't
currently logged on, as well as when they're on. Keeps the messages
until the user goes to look for them.
I can not responsibly propose any alternative
right now and it seems it
is not the topic of this e-mail. I assure you there are already better
alternatives for desktop and minimal installations to exchange
diagnostic messages than having a full blown mail server installed.
Simplicity is divine.
Using email is quite convenient for all those purposes, and makes it
very easy to forward messages onto someone else, should you need a
second set of eyes to check something out.
How often a regular desktop or mobile Linux user checks that e-mails
thrown in root's mailbox somewhere in the system? I read logs regularly
on my servers, sometimes on my desktops but I hardly ever read root's
mailbox on my desktop and I don't think I'm alone. I do not even bother
to configure my GUI mail client to do this.
I really have nothing against passing diagnostic messages over mail
infrastructure but I don't think it is the best approach for all Linux
users today. It should be more like an option to choose not enforcement.
Mateusz Marzantowicz