Sloppy error checking in MS code

[Dhawal Doshy]

Quoting Glenn Steen <glenn.steen at gmail.com>:

> On 17/12/06, Mike Jakubik <mikej at rogers.com> wrote:
>> Rob Freeman wrote:
>>> If any of those problems happen, u have more troubles then MailScanner.
>>> Personally, it is not MailScanners job to monitor a server for disk space,
>>> permissions, or any other OS / HW problems.  And if someone is tampering
>>> with permissions, well one has much more issues then getting mail at that
>>> point.
>>>
>>
>> I never stated that MS should monitor my system, it should however fail
>> gracefully and not eat messages.
> Quite a resonable standpoint. And we're all pretty sure that this is
> the state of things too;). But we should look, yes.

Time for me to add some facts (of course for my point of view) here,  
since i follow the postfix list very regularly..

Wietse and Viktor from my little interaction with them have no problem  
with any Filtering tool (including mailscanner) as long as it uses one  
of the *documented* interfaces (how is not what i mention here, read  
the thread below for wietse's comment)

The comment on the mailscanner code being sloppy was made by *ahem*  
'Mark Martinec' of amavisd-new fame.. See this thread:
http://groups.google.com/group/list.postfix.users/browse_thread/thread/d919f921151c8cb3/d1ac170a6838855f?lnk=gst&q=mailscanner&rnum=1#d1ac170a6838855f

It is therefore understandable that Mark made this comment (and  
probably rightly so).. however let us look at the larger picture and  
those who can read code, ought to make an effort to 'audit' the code  
for the *so called* sloppiness just to re-assure themselves (and  
probably others).

 From my point of view again, checking for free disk space and other  
such things is *not* mailscanner's job.. as long as it fails  
gracefully and consistently.. there shouldn't be a scope for a *maybe*  
anywhere. And why blame postfix? the locking for sendmail changed as  
well a few versions back (try and recollect the number of times people  
on this list have been using the wrong locking mechanism for  
sendmail).. something for exim changed as well breaking things for a  
while.

Finally a few words about DJB, if you can code even half as well as  
him then you have all the right to criticize else just shut up and use  
something else. How many pieces of code from the last century work as  
they were documented.. till today???

- dhawal