Can I remove sendmail?

[Mateusz Marzantowicz]

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