[libvirt-users] Re: Performance tuning questions for mail server

[Nicolas Sebrecht]

The 10/10/11, Eric Blake wrote:
> On 10/10/2011 03:52 PM, Alex wrote:
> >I made this change by editing the xml, restarting libvirtd, then using
> >virsh to define the xml file and received this message:

<...>

> >Have I done something wrong, or am I missing something?
> 
> Yes, you goofed by directly editing /etc/libvirt.  By doing that,
> you are going behind libvirt's back - if your edits happen to work,
> then a libvirtd restart will use them, but if you introduce a typo
> or other problem, then it is your fault that libvirt can't get
> things to work. If you had instead gone through the libvirt API
> (such as by using 'virsh edit bwimail02'), then libvirt would do
> some sanity checking up front and refuse to install your changes
> unless they were safe.

Which is comunterintuitive, IMHO. Admins are used to edit configuration
files in /etc because most software are designed this way.

Files not designed to be edited may stand in /var. At least, current
files in /etc could have a header with comments from preventing manual
edition and tips on how to deal to change configuration. ,-p

-- 
Nicolas Sebrecht