Reasons behind defaulting atd and sendmail

[Mikkel L. Ellertson]

Mike Cronenworth wrote:
> 
>> If you have a mail server on your LAN, you can configure Sendmail to
>> use it without much trouble. It is also not that hard to configure
>> Sendmail to accept incoming connections. All it takes is editing or
>> removing one line, and regenerating the config file. Or if you are
>> brave, you can edit the config file directly. The change is fairly easy.
> 
> Why would a user who installed using the default Fedora method need to
> do this? No one has given me an example. Just the fact that you can do
> it, which I already knew.
> 
Hopefully, a Fedora is not going to be a new Linux user, or at least
an above average computer users, there are probably going to be
several cron jobs that send mail to other places. For example, if
you are a registered Linux user, you are probably going to be
sending an e-mail with machine stats from a cron job. Then you have
people like me that send out a monthly calender that is generated
and mailed by a monthly cron job. Others use an alias of root to
send the output of cran jobs, check root kit, and other programs to
an e-mail account on another machine. Depending on your ISP, this
may not require you to do anything except edit the alias file. Or
you may need to set a relay host. Anyone using Fedora had better be
smart enough to do that, or at least ask for help with it. After
all, if they are going to set up Thunderbird, they are going to need
the same information.

Using atd is more problematical. It depends on how the user is using
the system. For some, using the batch command to run a job when the
system isn't busy cam be handy. (batch uses atd.) For others being
able to run a job at a specific future time, without having to set
up a cron job to do it, may be handy.

Remember, we are talking Fedora users here. In most cases, this is
not a distribution for someone moving over from Windows. If all you
want to do is brows the web, and use e-mail, there are much better
distribution for doing that. On the other hand, if you like to
tinker, or test out new software, it is a good distribution for that.

Mikkel
-- 

  Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons,
for thou art crunchy and taste good with Ketchup!
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