dovecot - Nov 2016 - Feedback on first, i.e. novice-level, experiences with dovecot

a) google: "dovecot imap configuration" brought an article from 2005
as
the first item:

while I like debian and a bit of history you may want to ask yourself 
how to improve your site as the primary hit from google. FYI: years ago 
I had great results in the top of google searches - and then I made a 
major error - I moved my site to a new url and google forgot me.

b) using your http://wiki.dovecot.org/QuickConfiguration as a guide:

I built dovecot using --prefix=/opt (I abhor /usr/local these days - 
that is so 1984ish). The applications got installed in /opt/bin

root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# ls -ltr /opt
total 36
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Nov 20 14:33 lib
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Nov 20 14:33 include
drwxr-xr-x 6 root root 4096 Nov 20 14:33 share
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Nov 20 14:33 libexec
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 20 14:33 sbin
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 20 14:33 bin

Are the directories 'make install' touched or made.

root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core#  /opt/bin/doveconf -n

# 2.3.devel (92c8109): /opt/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf
doveconf: Fatal: open(/opt/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf) failed: No such 
file or directory

where are example configs?

root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# find /opt -name example-config
root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core#

Not in /opt

How about a default config?

root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# find / -name dovecot
/etc/init.d/dovecot
/etc/pam.d/dovecot
/etc/default/dovecot
/etc/dovecot
/var/lib/dovecot
^C

Seems to be /etc/dovecot

root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# ls -l /etc/dovecot
total 40
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root    4096 Apr 30  2015 conf.d
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root    4180 Jun  8  2014 dovecot.conf
-rw-r----- 1 root dovecot  410 Jun  8  2014 dovecot-db.conf.ext
-rw-r----- 1 root dovecot  782 Jun  8  2014 dovecot-dict-sql.conf.ext
-rw-r--r-- 1 root dovecot 1363 Apr 30  2015 dovecot.pem
-rw-r----- 1 root dovecot 5348 Jun  8  2014 dovecot-sql.conf.ext
drwx------ 2 root root    4096 Apr 30  2015 private
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root     121 Jun  8  2014 README

and finally - read README to find the examples:

root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# cat /etc/dovecot/README
Configuration files go to this directory. See example configuration files in
/usr/share/doc/dovecot-core/example-config/

Conclusion:

--prefix=/opt is not applied everywhere.

* More first impressions as I come to them - if you want them - as I 
hope this helps make dovecot better!

Michael

On 20/11/2016 14:51, Michael Felt wrote:
> root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# cat /etc/dovecot/README
> Configuration files go to this directory. See example configuration 
> files in
> /usr/share/doc/dovecot-core/example-config/
>
> Conclusion:
>
> --prefix=/opt is not applied everywhere.
>
> * More first impressions as I come to them - if you want them - as I 
> hope this helps make dovecot better!
Next experience:

root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# cp /etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf 
/opt/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf
root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core#  /opt/bin/doveconf -n
# 2.3.devel (92c8109): /opt/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf
doveconf: Fatal: Error in configuration file 
/opt/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf line 94: No matches

So, I shall look into why no matches are found using vi

More later.

On 20/11/2016 16:36, Michael Felt wrote:
> More later. 
So, part of my confusion may be resolved - I was thinking $prefix only, 
where there are three:

 From the default config file (though still unknowing what the fatal 
error) contains:

# options. The paths listed here are for configure --prefix=/usr
# --sysconfdir=/etc --localstatedir=/var

However, I still would have expected 
/usr/share/doc/dovecot-core/example-config/ to be behind /opt. Or is 
there yet another ./configure setting I skipped?

On 20/11/2016 13:51, Michael Felt wrote:
> I built dovecot using --prefix=/opt (I abhor /usr/local these days -
> that is so 1984ish). The applications got installed in /opt/bin
Well done but I urge you to go a step further.  You should put your 
builds in a sub level of /opt/ to distinguish and avoid clashes with 
other people's builds in /opt.  eg, if you choose "felt" as your
[not
guaranteed unique but you are not a commercial vendor] identifier then 
your will install into /opt/felt.

--prefix=/opt/felt


> # 2.3.devel (92c8109): /opt/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf
> doveconf: Fatal: open(/opt/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf) failed: No such
> file or directory
>
> where are example configs?
>
> root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# find /opt -name
example-config
> root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core#
>
> Not in /opt
>
> How about a default config?
>
> root at x066:/data/prj/aixtools/dovecot/core# find / -name dovecot
> /etc/init.d/dovecot
> /etc/pam.d/dovecot
> /etc/default/dovecot
> /etc/dovecot
> /var/lib/dovecot
> ^C
>
> Seems to be /etc/dovecot

I apply [the equivalent of]:

VID=...  <- eg "felt"

./configure \
  --prefix=/opt/${VID} \
  --mandir=/opt/${VID}/share/man \
  --docdir=/opt/${VID}/share/doc/dovecot \
  --sysconfdir=/etc/opt/${VID} \
  --localstatedir=/var/opt/${VID} \
  ... other options


Using /etc/opt/${VID} and /var/opt/${VID} and not /opt/${VID}/etc/ keeps 
things consistent with the case where /opt is read only.  Mine isn't but 
I don't have to think.

Your dovecot.conf will be:
/etc/opt/${VID}/dovecot/dovecot.conf



James.