We need a new subject- bug fixes

[Les Mikesell]

Rahul Sundaram wrote:

>>> Fedora generally doesnt deviate from upstream defaults. So what 
>>> configuration upstream ships with indeed does matter here.
>>
>> Errr... except where it suits their fancy - like omitting java 
>> bindings,  multimedia plugins, and configuring sendmail not to receive 
>> mail.
> 
> It is not a question of fancy. Nobody patches for "fancy".
> 
> 1) Not sure which java bindings you are referring to but anyone is free 
> to maintain additional packages in Fedora.

OpenOffice is the particular thing I had in mind, but I suspect there 
are others.  I'm not talking about additional packages - this is in 
reference to your comment about not deviating from upstream.

> 2) You are probably talking about proprietary multimedia codecs which 
> are omitted due to licensing reasons. Usually doesnt require changing 
> any configuration upstream since they are modular components in 
> gstreamer cleanly split out into -good -bad and -ugly.

I'll give you this one.

> 3) Security. Daemons connecting to external ports by default is a bad 
> idea. Well documented reasons. Configuration changes are easier to 
> manage compared to other kind of patches too.

I suppose if you break a program's intended functionality there's not so 
much to maintain.  That doesn't seem like a great thing to do, though, 
especially without providing an easy/obvious way undo it.  In any case 
it is hard to imagine any 'upstream' version of sendmail ever delivered 
with that configuration.

-- 
   Les Mikesell
    lesmikesell at gmail.com