The challenge of customizing Dovecot

[Robert Moskowitz]

On 03/22/2017 09:16 PM, Rob McAninch wrote:
>> On Mar 22, 2017, at 18:25, Robert Moskowitz <rgm at htt-consult.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>> On 03/22/2017 11:36 AM, chaouche yacine wrote:
>>> Robert,
>>>
>>> What would be the benefit of using sed against making customized files and just copying them ? I'd probably just want to copy a working version of /etc/dovecot/ conf files instead of modifying my existing files with sed scripts (or create new ones with cat).
>> new options are left unaltered.  I learned this with postfix, to use postconf instead of trying to replace main.cf.
>>
>> I thought about mv old confs then cat new confs, but again, there are other things set up, and I worked at changing what needed customization, rather than wholesale replacement.
> Did you consider putting your customization in a local.conf which should be tried at the end? Could put whatever explanation in there you want. On a system like Debian this would more easily allow the default files to be upgraded without intervention.
>
I have not seen any reference to a local.conf.  Can you point this out 
to me?  I will have to see that it is maintained in Centos.  But some of 
the mods are additions (like plugins) to existing lines.  I would have 
to find out how those are processed.

thanks